From the Future, Hindsight
by The Ferryman
Summary: Salem wants humanity (and faunus) dead. Ozpin wants to return the favor. But certain universal truths remain. People behave in unexpected ways. When someone faces an imposed existential crisis, they often try to return the favor. What you don't see isn't nearly as lethal as what you don't understand. Enough gravity Dust can tear apart a planet...or give someone a second chance.
1. Trailer 1: Titanium

**Disclaimer** : I don't own RWBY.

Author notes: There are a few (admittedly rare) well-written 2nd person POV stories out there (Jbern's Bungle in the Jungle comes to mind), and quite a few rotating 1st person, or limited 3rd, or…

This started as me experimenting with point-of-view and tenses and then sort of got out of hand. And so we have a 2nd person PoV, plus 1st person riding shotgun, and 3rd following others around. And, because time-travel tends to muck with tenses, the 2nd PoV should be (hopefully) present tense, while the 3rd should all be in past.

RWBY

*Titanium Trailer*

Cue: 'Titan' by Cruxshadows

The aging Atlesian-290 'Paladin' has autocannons, energy beams, a rocket pack with an impressive number of reloads, and a mean right hook. The Dread Knight Combat Chassis while appearing very much like the older mech, is a rather different beast within and without.

For starters, the heavy autocannon in each arm fires an armor-piercing 'military ball' that has sufficient penetrative power to bust its way through three goliaths stacked nose-to-tail. The lasers mounted sidecar have sufficient energy transfer that they explode—rather than cut or melt—anything they strike. Heavy machine guns, incinerators, plasma-rifles, grenade and missile launchers, particle beams cover the torso, and scythe-like blades tip the fingers and toes. I once watched a greater wyrm swallow a Dread Knight whole, only for the mech to cut its way out of its side.

It makes the force arrayed against me kind of a joke. But I've been on the other side of the joke, and won, too often to laugh.

I reprioritize feed queues. Armor-piercing ammunition swaps with explosive-cored blast-fragmentation warheads. A ruby-colored laser sweeps out and shreds a dozen knights. Machineguns rattle, scything down another windrow of hapless robots. I reach out and trigger the autocannons, blasting great rents into their line. And then I am on top of the feeble force of conventional armor.

Return fire, disorganized and ineffective for more than marring and streaking my armor, reaches back towards me as they burn.

I turn towards you, toss an irreverent salute, and then the gravity-dust induction drive kicks on and burn dust kicks me away from the planet the induction drive is allowing me to—for the moment—pretend doesn't exist.

Ahead and above me flies the last air armada in Remnant.

The one that is coming for us.

For you.

A monitor in the cockpit covers the aft the Dread Knight. Centered on you. At what lays beyond you.

Maybe they're right but we don't have a choice anymore.

Gravity dust has freed me of Remnant's shackles, and a combination of burn and wind dust gave the Dread Knight more thrust than anything its size should be able to lay claim to. It is far nimbler than the most agile fighter, faster than anything short of a transonic transport, and if it doesn't have a battleship's awesome armor it's because it doesn't _need_ it.

But even as I start to destroy the fleet, part of me is with you watching the baleful red digits counting down the last minutes of the world. I can't really blame them for deciding that if they weren't going to be allowed to live in the world in peace then no one should. I can't even really blame them for deciding that if they were going to be exterminated then so should everyone else.

That doesn't mean that I would let those numbers keep counting down if I could stop it any more than you would. And unlike me, you might be able to do something about it. Which is why I get the air fleet and you get the doomsday weapon.

Penetrating the first case is easy.

You open it up while I'm using the Dread Knight's particle beams to turn a pair of fighters into metallic splinters.

Once you do you are looking at a maze of devices, switches, cables and wires that may or may not lead to anything, a small screen that flipping through pictures of all the really nasty stuff humans and faunus have done to each other, and a _mirror_ of all things.

After that things get complicated for a while. I'm still aware of you, of everything you're aware of, but now I need to concentrate on the fighters, dropships, cruisers, and assault ships.

By the time I touch down I'm out of ammo and missiles, burn and thunder and wind and…pretty much everything except gravity Dust and I don't really have much more than what I need to not leave a crater when I touch down.

You turn, and I can see the Dread Knight in your eyes. Armor shattered and rent, fluids leaking from joint casings as smoke billows from a missing shoulder plate, is standing behind you. You lift your scroll and the face lights up. The Dread Knight keels over and then a face—my face—appears on the scroll.

"They're breaking off! Did you get it?" I ask. Because unlike conventional life they might actually survive this if you haven't.

You look at the black plate that is the part of the weapon you're able to actually reach. The whole thing is _huge_. Bigger than you. Bigger than the Dread Knight. Some joker had painted the name 'Final Answer' above the access plate you removed.

You've managed, barely, to expose the core of the weapon without setting it off. Before you is the single largest concentration of gravity dust ever assembled, surrounding it is a shell of gravity and burn dust. All that is needed to generate a gravitic-lensing effect strong enough to destroy the world.

"No," you say. Maybe if you had another day, heck, another _hour_ and maybe but… You sigh and slump with your back to the weapon. "I'm sorry," you say, not sure if you're talking to the world, the pitifully few people still alive, or the face peering out of your scroll at you. "I love yo—"

Black swallows us as Remnant is torn apart.


	2. Trailer 2: Cobalt

**Disclaimer** : I don't own RWBY, neither do you (this is, admittedly, an assumption on my part but I think it's a pretty good one)

RWBY

Cobalt trailer

Cue: *Big Iron* (Johnny Cash cover)

I'm alive

You're alive.

Or maybe we're in hell.

Quite possibly both.

You are laying on hardpacked dirt. Hardpacked because the absolutely brutal sun has leeched anything even _thinking_ of imagining it's moisture from the ground.

There is nothing around you. No terrain. No plants. No wildlife. Certainly no people.

You push yourself up and fish out the mouthpiece for the hydration rig and finish off the few sips you have left. If you are dead it won't matter. If you _aren't_ dead, maybe it'll keep things from changing for a few more hours.

You tap your scroll. A moment later your best friend—at this point maybe your only friend—is looking back out at you.

 _We're…alive?_ I ask.

"Define 'alive.'" Your reply is as dry as a desert.

 _Funny,_ I huff. _Oh hey, I've got a_ tower _in range._

"You do?"

 _It's not one of the CCTs, just a relay tower. And I don't have full access._

"Where are we?"

 _Beyond the Wall, in the Blight._

You nod. Generally, any area outside of the four Kingdoms is 'beyond the Wall.' Despite the name, some areas are actually pretty nice. The Blight is one of the not-so-nice parts where nature, Grimm, and people all generally try to kill one another. In this case, more often than not it is nature doing the killing.

"Figures. Any place close? I need water, shelter, and food."

A way to pay for all three would be nice. If that repeater station can link to the CCTs there are any number of accounts you might be able to draw on. If they can't…you'd prefer not to dip into your emergency reserves.

It can't. Damn.

 _And money…_ I add. _Let's see… No. No. Nope. Nuh-uh. Not that one. Or that. Or…seriously? Oh. Hey, I've got access to the job boards._

"You do?" you ask. "They've been down for months."

 _Maybe they haven't gotten the word yet?_ I offer, but it's doubtful. To say the world is fucked is a considerable understatement. _Okay. I've got a job for you._

"A job?"

 _Bounty. Open contract, alive or dead. Human. Operates under the alias Tec'sus Red. Known to frequent the town of Cold Water which is north of our present location._

"What's he wanted for?"

 _Arson, looting, murder, pillaging, robbery-bank, robbery-train…_

"No rape?"

 _Chronologically between the looting and pillaging. Arson is a rather late addition—oh, I see. The list itself is alphabetical. It's listed as sexual assault. Do you want particulars?_

"Pass. "

You'd really rather hunt Grimm but beggars can't be choosers.

"How many people did he kill?"

 _One and nineteen more._

"Let's go bag an outlaw."

RWBY

Cold Water was a dustbowl.

It was a smudge about two centuries out of date where a dirt track widened into a dusty street lined with one- and two-level clap-board businesses. A stretch of not terribly straight and not at all smooth raised wooden sidewalks separated mud from business during the wet season (assuming there was one), and small-d-dust from the business during the dry.

There were the usual mix of businesses. Here a livery stable, there a boarding house, a pub, a saloon, a bar, a gambling den (named 'the Gambling Den' of all things), a lawyer, a dentist on the floor above the barbershop, a doctor above the lawyer (probably not a good sign that).

Here and there a flash of tech reminded you which century you were in.

You wander into the bar first.

"What can I get you?" the barman asks.

"Whiskey," you reply, shrugging out of your pack. "And top these off," you add, pulling out the hydration bladder and an empty canteen. You stomach rumbles. "Food."

"Got money?"

No. But… "Bulk silver?" you offer, dropping a couple of pieces on the bar.

He grunts, then grumbles, then reaches under the bar and comes up with a scale that he flicks on before reaching for the silver.

"Mind if I test it first?"

He stops and gives you a look somewhere between surly and approving so you fish out a carved figure of a beowolf and put it on the scale. It hums and then spits out a number that's pretty close so you nod in agreement.

He weighs, then takes some silver, and then some more, and you pocket the rest. He plops down a tumbler of whiskey along with some lien and disappears briefly with your water bladder and canteen and comes back with an omelet.

"What brings you to Cold Water?" he asks.

"Huntress," you reply, tapping your scroll to bring up your ID. "I won't be too long in town."

"Oh?" he asks. "We don't get many of your type around here."

"I've come to take an outlaw back alive, or maybe dead."

"Maybe?"

"The job board says it doesn't matter," you reply. Then add: "I'm after Tec'sus Red."

That sort of kills conversation. The locals are all trading looks and you wonder how long it'll take word to get back to Red.

You repeat this (aside from the water and omelet) at the pub, and then the saloon.

It's twenty past eleven when you step out in the street considering the gambling hall. It's quiet. Too quiet.

You look around. The saloon you just left is very firmly closing its doors but there are folks plastered to the window. Everybody held their breath.

There was one person walking down the middle of the street.

Red hair, scraggly beard. Yeah, it's Tec'sus Red. Notched grip on his gun and everything.

"That's close enough!" you call.

He stops.

"Drop your gunbelt."

"And if I don't?"

"Dead or alive, I'm bringing you in. Makes no difference to me, but it might to you."

"Men have tried to take me before. All of them are dead," he taunts back.

You shrug and walk out into the street. The sun is high above you. Maybe he's got a bit of an advantage for having been out in it instead of in a building, but that edge is fleeting and he doesn't know it.

"I'm not a man," you observe, miming a curtsey.

He doesn't reply except to start walking again.

You loosen Last Dance in its holster. You don't anticipate using it, but it's part of the ritual. Then you do the same with your sidearm and use the motion to dial in some adjustments. Tec'sus Red doesn't have an activated aura and it's easier to take him back in mostly one piece.

There are twelve meters between you when he stops again.

His hand moves.

He's young, with the reflexes of youth. He's killed, had practice at killing, so he knows what he's about. But for all that youth and experience he doesn't have an activated aura, and most of the people he's killed haven't had activated auras either. The exceptions he either took by surprise, or they tried to take him alive and he felt no such compunction.

That matters.

An activated aura isn't just a shield. It lets you carry more, run faster, jump higher, lift far more than you should be able to. Nora couldn't bench five times her mass simply because of her semblance.

He moves first, but you move faster.

He has his fingers curled around the grips of his gun.

You've got yours in a two-handed grip, right foot back.

He's starting to draw when you're taking a moment to line up the shot, and then you put the first round through his heart.

You put two more into a grouping less than one centimeter wide just for good measure.

If someone wants to do an autopsy they'll have to use a ladle to collect the scraps of his heart.

Folks are gathering round as you pull out your scroll. "Go ahead and post. Tec'sus Red is dead."

 _Okay_. My voice is subdued.

"What?"

 _I've got better reception here and, well… You'd better sit down._

"I need to collect Red and get off this street first."

You put the scroll away and now you can hear the crowd murmuring. "…tried to match a Huntress with a big iron on her hip."


	3. Volume 1, Chapter 1: Vala bar-Adama

**Disclaimer** : I make no claim to the ownership of RWBY.

RWBY

 **Volume One, Chapter One** : Vala bar-Adama

After using so many names and wearing so many faces it is sometimes hard to remember your own. It got harder as the people who reminded you who you were started dying. More and more often you don't want to remember, because then you remember not just them, but a time when you were actually happy.

But you remember Vale. Not as you last saw it, but as you first saw it.

Or at least how you once saw it.

How tall the buildings were, how clean everything was, how the people smiled… It was a welcoming place, which sort of made sense because Vale-the-harbor wasn't called the crossroads of the world for nothing.

And the sky!

Someone had once described it as a mood-ring for the planet. In the last few years, the sky had faded into a dull, grey overcast, leached of color.

Which is why you're walking down the streets of Vale in the dark of a Sunday night and marveling out how _not_ totally trashed the City of Vale was. The Vale you remember last seeing was a leprous, cancerous rotting mass. The Vale you are walking through is clean and…happy. The mood-ring sky is clear inky blackness and chips of ice and diamonds glittered down at you.

What the fuck.

 _Seriously_ …what the fuck?

"Come up with anything yet?" you ask.

 _Not really_ , I reply. _A strong enough gravity field is theoretically capable of distorting time—_

"And if a hundred, heck, if a _thousand_ years had passed I might believe that," you say. "Besides, we're talking about black holes. Millions, _tens_ of millions of gravities. They didn't have anywhere near that quantity of gravity dust. I don't care how you amplify it."

 _Proof of the existence of those big-g Gods Ozpin used to talk about?_

"I'm too sober for this discussion," you mutter.

The sound of breaking glass catches your attention.

You recognize the weapon—how could you not?—before you do the girl holding it. Crimson Rose is shiny and new, all sharp edges and gleaming purpose. Its mistress looks absurdly young. And that makes the redhead in the white suit a dead man.

Make that a man who is—was?— _supposed_ to be dead.

The blonde standing next to Ruby Rose is another person who is supposed to be dead. Unlike the man, you don't know that for a fact. You don't know anyone who said they watched her die. But too much had happened after she disappeared for her not to have died.

Unless she had tried to disappear.

You wouldn't blame her if she had. Most of the survivors had, at least for a time. But if so, why come out of hiding?

You _really_ don't want to contemplate the hows or whys but you don't seem to have a lot of choice because a bullhead at least a dozen years out of date but yet still gleaming new is pulling up.

Your sidearm is in your hand before you can think of drawing it. Your thumb flips the power setting to the stops as I lay a targeting pip into your field of vision. Your right foot is sliding back and you now have both hands on the weapon.

You hesitate.

You never did find out what all had been happening. Maybe the others knew, or had known bits and pieces. By the time everyone was together there hadn't been sufficient time and back-story had been largely irrelevant.

You're still shying away from the logical conclusion that defines your present reality, but at the same time you can't help but ask yourself whether taking out Torchwick and Cinder would make it worse.

From the power she was throwing around in the battle she already has some of Autumn's power.

What will happen if one of the hosts of a single Maiden's power is killed? Will it snap back to the girl in the tube Jaune told you all about a lifetime ago (or is it a lifetime from now?), or will it move on to the next host?

A flicker at the back of your mind, the long-ago Huntress who had once cared about innocent people more than ending threats to them, asked what would happen if you brought down the bullhead over this segment of the city?

A moment longer and you reluctantly sigh and crack it open. You've already fished one shell off your belt, and quick fingers replace one liberated with it.

Aim, give the tracker a look at its target, then elevate. A soft _thump_ kicks it free with nearly no recoil. You spot the brief tongue of fire only because you know exactly where to be looking at, and then it is lost against the blackness of light, the glare of the city, and the flash of Crystal and Dust fire.

You pull out your scroll. And only when you get the signal from the tracker do you reholster your weapon.

Looks like time may just be on your side.

RWBY

Ozpin sipped from his mug. Much like his cane, it was a prop he had found useful on more than one occasion. Movement was a simple way of drawing people's attention away from something you'd rather they not notice. In this case it gave him a moment to compose himself and _not_ sigh at the other man in his office.

"She's ready, Qrow."

"No she isn't."

"I watched the imagery of tonight's…altercation."

"She's not ready, Ozpin," Qrow insisted.

"Your own records have her fighting well in advance on her year."

"She's not half as good with that grass-cutter as she thinks she is. She's compensating for her weaknesses—"

"All of us do," Ozpin said pointedly as he gestured with his mug towards Qrow's flask.

"Except she doesn't realize she's doing it," Qrow said. "She needs the stuffing knocked out of her and—"

"And Beacon can provide that," Ozpin said. "Who at Signal can? Besides yourself?"

"Any of the un-armed combat instructors. You take that over-sized pop-gun from her and she's a half-step short of helpless."

"And the rest of her classes? You were recommending she be passed a year up anyway, Qrow."

"A year. _One_ year. Not—"

Both broke off as an elevator continued its climb past the CCT offices.

"Were you expecting someone else?"

"Only to be having this conversation with Taiyang," Ozpin said as he walked to his desk. He leaned his cane against it. Then refreshed his mug before turned so that he leaned against the desk, a picture of ease…with his cane three inches from his right hand.

"Tai had grading to finish. If you can't convince me it's worth the effort to convince him, you'll be having this conversation with him anyway." Qrow looked at the elevator, then turned and walked to one of the glass windows. "I can't be seen here," he said, opening a door.

A muted ding announced the arrival of the elevator.

The door slid open to reveal a woman.

RWBY

Ozpin.

Ozpin _alive_.

Mind. Is. Blown.

If you ever needed proof that you are in the past, it's staring at you.

The question is: is this your past? Is it _the_ past? Or is it _a_ past?

Oh, and does it matter?

You're pretty sure the answer to the last one is 'no', but…

"Well, Ms.—"

"bar-Adama," you say quickly, rubbing a hand through your cobalt-blue hair. If there was any team that could create a healthy dye-job it was RWBY. You sincerely doubted there is another team that knew more, collectively, about hair care. The color was a dare from Ren, and you'd found you liked it. Keeping it neat and healthy was a pain, but it was the one luxury you've allowed yourself for the last…two years? Three?

Ozpin sips at his mug. "bar-Adama, you are looking…older."

"Um?" you ask, because the only thing harder to accept than that you are now in the past, is that Ozpin recognizes you _despite_ your being in the past. "Well…yes, I suppose I am."

"Is there a particular reason why you don't want me calling you—"

"I'm not her…anymore?" you ask.

He blinks at you owlishly.

"And, I've gotten used to being Vala bar-Adama." Also a half-dozen other aliases, but Vala had special meaning, and as far as you—or I—are aware, it's one identity that Salem (or her minions) have never cracked.

"Hmm… We tracked the Bullhead you placed the beacon on. It was abandoned."

You nod because you hadn't really expected anything else. You'd just had to press your scroll against his to transfer not only the details for the beacon, but the tracking program.

It had been a shock before you remembered how inept cybernetic security was— _is_. How trusting you all were. It shouldn't have been a surprise. Cinder had hacked the CCT in less than thirty seconds, managed to hack Amity Colosseum at the same time, and had hijacked an Atlasian battleship just as easily.

There was a thought. You weren't a great hacker by the standards of the time you'd left. I, though, am probably a not-very-minor deity. Do you want to infest the world's computer and communications network first to deny it to the enemy? Or do you start a world-wide revolution in cyber-security and…deny the world's computer and communication network to the enemy?

"Roman Torchwick? Cinder?" you asked.

"Is that her name?" he asks in reply.

 _Oops_ , I whisper through the implant in your mastoid.

Yes. "As much of one as we were ever able to get for her," you say instead.

Ozpin hesitates—only briefly, a slight tremble as he lifts his mug but it's there. "Well. That's…unfortunate."

How much do you reveal? That's the real question, isn't it?

You don't doubt that Ozpin is on the 'good' side, though really the whole thing is far too complicated and murky for such concepts of 'good' and 'evil' to have much meaning. Still, of the various plans for the world pretty much anyone's is better than _hers_ …except Ironwood.

Maybe.

Not that Ironwood is bad, or even evil. Just…inflexible. And already in a very awkward position because of someone whose name rhymes with 'knee'. And he has a really hard time delegating. And utterly convinced that all of his choices and decisions are correct. And he has a harder time understanding that other people may have equally valid ideas than he does delegating. And once he made any decision he had a very difficult time giving it up, even after he himself recognized it had been the wrong decision. And…this list has gotten long enough.

"It could be worse," you finally say.

"Oh?" Ozpin asked.

"If there's one thing I learned, it's that it could always be worse."

Ozpin hummed softly.

"How do we know any of what you are saying is the truth?" Glynda Goodwitch asked.

You'd been sort of expecting this for a while now. Most of your weapons—all the visible ones and most of the hidden ones—had been taken. They'd been polite, but firm, and you couldn't really fault them for it. They'd also taken most of your tools and…stuff. But not everything.

You sit back and decide to lay it out for everyone to see. "That's the real trick, isn't it?" you ask. "Anything in your future hasn't happened yet. Might not happen if I play my cards right. Anything in your past I could have learned from…somewhere else."

"I suppose we're at an impasse then," she doesn't, quite, smirk at you.

You tilt your head to the left, then the right, then bring out your scroll. It is, quite obviously, several generations in advance of what is in current use. You have your official license, but at this point the Hunters have been using scrolls as a form of ID. A small, sequestered memory block holds particulars of training, special skills, medical data, and a select history of past hunts and contracts. It is this that you pull up, then slide the scroll across the table to Ozpin with a flick of your fingers.

He sets aside his mug and brushes a finger across the screen, then again. His lips purse.

"It's a bit out of date. World-wide communication finally went dark for good about three years ago my-time, and I wasn't able to get to a guild-house in the last half year or so."

Ozpin leans towards you and gives you a very intent look. "How did you come to be here, Ms.…bar-Adama?"

You take a deep breath. "I've seen people use their aura to enhance their speed. And those whose semblance enhanced their speed. Even a couple who've used both. I like to think I'm pretty quick, but outracing time itself is a stretch."

"Ms. _bar-Adama_ …" The way Glinda glares at you and spits your name tells you that Ozpin hasn't shared the little secret of your identity with her which is all sorts of interesting. Especially since he's clearly let on some of the stuff he knows.

"I don't know. Okay? I. Don't. Know. Someone assembled enough gravity Dust to crack the crust of Remnant and kill every living person on the planet. I was at ground zero, but instead of being dead I wake up in the past. What I do know is that the future sucks. It sucks big. We lost. Don't you get that?"

"How?"

You shake your heard.

"What _happened_?" Ozpin asked.

"Short version? You got played. Humanity, faunus, all got played. And while you were _dealing_ , a third party came in and basically wiped the board."

"Who?"

"Someone not in play yet, and I'm going to keep it that way."

Ozpin sighed tiredly. You had honestly expected better.

"So…what now?" Glynda asked.

"I get a position on staff at Beacon."

"You are not interested in stopping this?" Ozpin asked.

"What I have knowledge of was fairly episodic, highly localized, and—at least for the immediate future—centered at Beacon. By the time I was in a position to learn what other opening moves had been made, I had other things to worry about. I could run around in the field, but if we're at a point where my being in the field will make a difference, then we're probably already screwed anyway. At Beacon, I know the pieces and the personalities involved. I don't know that trying to sway the outcome is going to make a difference, but it's probably a better use of my time than stomping around the world trying to change things I have no clue about.

"Besides, there are only a few access points to being able to shut down said third party. The best won't be available until autumn."

"That makes sense," Glynda said grudgingly. "What position were you thinking of?"

"Combat instruction."

"But I—"

"Teach group combat," you finish. "Essentially tournament combat. Not surprising with the Vytal Festival coming up, but that's not why you do it. I actually agree with your motivation, and it's effective, highly so. But at the same time, you aren't teaching them to actually fight Grimm, and you aren't teaching them to kill people."

"And you want to do that?" Ozpin asked sharply.

"No. Learning to fight Grimm in a classroom is a losing proposition. Only the least dangerous types can attempt to be contained on a regular basis and those are the ones such training is least needed for."

"And people?" Glynda asked.

You turn and give your former professor an even look. "Most of them are too caught up on the stories, even those on their last year. It takes a couple of years for experience to make them true Huntresses and Huntsmen. Beacon just keeps them alive long enough to gain that experience.

"If you tell them that you are training them to kill people right now, they'll bolt." Learning just how many people had died in the tunnel at Mountain Glenn was firmly in the top-five of your low-points at Beacon. Maybe if you'd managed to stop the train, made those deaths _matter_ …

"Fighting aura-enhanced individuals is perhaps not rare, but it is a decidedly uncommon mission. As for killing people, taking life is easy, especially for someone with an activate aura. It's dealing with the consequences that is hard.

"I can do that. Or at least I can try to provide them with the tools they need to put themselves back together in a useful and relatively timely manner. And some people could use a more…individualized push. For that matter, I could just post hours and individuals, or even single teams, can sign up on a first-come/first serve basis. But mostly I know where some people have big weaknesses. I may not be able to address those directly, but I should be able to at least provide the tools to help them work through their problems faster and better when they do crop up later."

"I don't know how many would take advantage of that kind of offering," Ozpin said.

"Probably not many. The point is to get me somewhere I can have access to events."

"It would also be difficult for me to justify that to the Council."

"Are you the Headmaster of Beacon or not?" you ask in reply.

Goodwitch bristles, but Ozpin smiles slightly and sits back. "True."

You huff and roll your eyes. "Fine. I can also handle active aura manipulation. That isn't a skill you offer."

"No," he agreed. "It isn't."

Knowledge, in this case, is a double-edged sword. He wants you around because you have it. At the same time he's not sure he wants you around because you aren't willing to spill everything and have goals that he can't be sure align with his own.

For that matter, you aren't too sure of your goals at the moment. Getting your former-future friends through the next few years alive and in one piece would be nice. But they aren't _your_ former-future friends. Seeing them again is going to bring a lot of pain you aren't at all looking forward to.

For that matter, it might not even be reasonable in all cases.

For one, you aren't sure if you can get Pyrrha through alive or even if you want to. For the sake of your childhood friend, yes. But the years have given you the ability to not _not_ see what is in front of you. Pyrrha excelled in tournaments, a place of structure, of rules, of patterns of behavior. It was apparent in most of JNPR's battles that their tactics were highly reliant on supporting her rather than being a truly integrated team. You'd lay good odds that finding herself in a life-and-death battle by herself for the first time had as much to do with her death as who she was going up against.

If she can't make the transition to team-oriented combat where the only rules are keeping your allies alive and putting down the enemy as hard as necessary, and you can't stop the Fall—and realistically you aren't sure how you _can_ stop it—then letting her live might be the worst thing you can do. In that environment, she would become an anchor dragging JNPR down. She's probably smart enough to walk away, but that would still be an emotional obstacle. If nothing else, it would prevent her from becoming the rallying symbol and source of strength she became as a martyr.

Unlike Pyrrha, you have absolutely no qualms about RWBY. RWBY always functioned at their best together and you fully intend to stack the deck so cold that even Old Man Schnee will think about relocating to someplace warmer.

"It's a good idea," Ozpin said finally.

"I suppose," Glynda isn't sold on the idea, but Ozpin's voice carries a lot of weight with her.

Ozpin doesn't say anymore for a long while. "Can you get my children ready to fight a war?"

"No," you say honestly. Not without raising questions about why you are training them to kill humans and faunus. You might get away with that in Atlas, but not Beacon. "Not in the time we have, but…I may just be able to help some of them survive one."

RWBY

The bullhead had been stolen—naturally, given who was involved—from Schnee Dust Company. It wasn't something ever followed up on the first time around (at least so far as you know), but given what else Torchwick was stealing you aren't particularly surprised.

Infiltrating the holding site is simple, which is not to say it's easy, but at least it's straightforward.

Once you're inside the bullhead you go to the cockpit and pull up a floor panel, a jack goes into the port on your scroll, the leads are clipped to the mess of electronic innards under the floor panel. And, since you happen to know the log-in of someone who just happened to be—is/are/will-be?—one of the senior-most people in the SDC…

Cinder hacking and crashing the global communications network didn't get Remnant to take a serious look at its cybersecurity. Hacking the Atlasian military's biggest battleship and its army of robots didn't manage to do so either. Vytal Festival Tournament? It took years for anyone to realize it had been hacked in the first place. It was assumed—wrongly—that the CCT was simply mechanical damage from the attack and that what happened at Vytal was simply someone wiring themselves into the stadium for the broadcast to take advantage of the matchups.

Crashing the Stadium later helped hide the intrusion of course.

You aren't a hacker by the standards of your personal chronology. On the other hand, you probably have a far better understanding of all the ways you can mess up computer networks than anyone short of a cyber-geek.

Once they get thinking about it anyway.

"Okay, time to wake up."

 _Do I have to?_ I whine in a sleepy-sounding slightly furry alto. Then the holo-emitter on your scroll warms and a figure of a woman, perhaps ten centimeters tall and apparently carved from a clear stone, shading from yellow at the feet to a deep purple at her head. I'd spent some time on the avatar to go with my new identity and I wanted to take a moment to show off but— _Okay. I'm in…_

 _Wow. I mean, I know security was non-existent but…wow. What do you want I should do?_

"Something that will be overlooked by whoever combs through its computer. But that once in contact with SDC servers will spread quickly. It needs to spread as widely as possible before it becomes obvious. And it can't spread beyond the SDC."

 _And highly infectious so that one server that get wiped can be reinfected if not taken off the network,_ I nod. _Okay, let's see, what's the most annoying thing I can do…_

"Aren't annoyances easily dealt with?" you ask. You _can_ hum the tune, a little.

 _For the people up-time—down-time?—whatever, yeah. For me not even that. But if_ this _is an example of standard security? It's almost all devoted to keeping unauthorized people out. Once you're in, you are all the way in. If I do anything more complex it's possible they'll never understand it. And it'll raise all sorts of questions about where it came from. This is simple. Messy, aggravating, simple-but-not-easy to fix. Okay, you can close up now._

"Ready for Phase II?" you ask.

 _Sure, sounds like fun._

RWBY

There are seven people in the room other than yourself. Three women, four men. Two faunus, five humans. Two of them you know, or will know, even though they don't yet know you.

Once more you shy away from determining what is the proper tense for a time traveler to use for past-future events (or possibly future-past events).

The others you know by reputation.

You hand out white envelopes. "That's your 'thanks for coming' money," you say. They already have their return tickets to wherever they came from.

"What is so important that you offer five thousand lien just to talk with us?"

That's Flattery Smith. Each of the others is essential, but Flattery's the one you want to run this operation because you certainly aren't going to have the time. Sixtyish, with bushy grey hair, warm eyes, a fondness for bright green clothes, and a wide smile she looks like she should be baking cookies for grandkids.

She has built six companies from the ground up, and sold each one. The last one she freely admitted to not having a clue to what the company actually did. You, or rather I, now have some funds, but there is a limit to how deep into the red we can run without a lot of awkward questions being asked. And there is another limit to how far you—and I—can fund it without even more awkward questions being asked.

"Two reasons," you say. "First, not one of you has any reason to feel loyalty or affection for the Schnee Dust Company."

Okay, that wasn't accurate. Most of them have a good reason to hate the SDC. And at least one will do anything he can to hurt it. You plan to give him direction and focus, and hopefully give him a chance to heal. If he doesn't, well, he could do a lot of damage to the SDC, but it would ruin your reputation, this company, and pretty much all you are trying to accomplish.

"Second, you are all very good at what you do."

"And what is that, exactly? I don't recognize you or any of the others."

Jasper Bull has his namesake's horns, _and_ personality. At one time, he'd been a senior artillery developer for the Atlasian military, and he was still probably the best ballistics guy in the business. But Atlas had gone high-tech cybernetic and everything he'd built discarded.

"There are two parts," you say. "Oscar Webber-Yell, Liberty Bittersweet, and Jordy Lincoln."

Oscar is maybe twenty-five with corn-yellow hair, and glasses framing blue eyes. He's wearing a black shirt advertising some band you've never heard of with ripped off sleeves. Jordy Lincoln is about the same age, but taller, with nice shoulders, pale hair shorn close to his scalp and blue-green eyes. Liberty is _maybe_ sixteen, wearing a faded blue blouse and worn skirt, and she has large fennec ears projecting out of blue-green hair. She is easily the most nervous of the bunch, and while the others tucked their envelopes away, she's wringing hers between her hands as though she's half-afraid they might take it away from her.

"Cyber security."

Everyone frowns a little, except Liberty who looks up at you with big eyes.

"Right now, everything is so interconnected, and everyone is afraid of what will happen if part of the computer network goes down, that no one has tried to attack it yet."

"What do you mean, 'attack'?" Bull asked.

"I mean shut it down. Prevent its use, or co-opt it for their own use. What would happen if the CCT stopped working? For that matter, what if a small group of people got into its systems and only allowed those who meet their price, use it? What would people do to get it back?"

You stand and motion for everyone to follow you. You've set up a half-dozen computers on a table. They are networked together, but only to each other.

"These computers are networked together," you say. "They aren't hooked up to the world network, but can simulate it in micro."

Bull and some of the others nod.

You go to one. You and I had already set up this demo so all the software is in. You went theatrical and attached a small box with a big, square, red button under a clear shield.

You offer the doomsday button but nobody wants to press it so you flip up the shield and press the button yourself.

"Have fun. Play solitaire or whatever…"

It doesn't take long.

"Hey, this stopped working!"

"The CPU is running at full bore." This from Oscar.

"It's a program running in the background," Liberty said. "This is… It's like a wildfire…no, that moves through an area and then leaves. This is cancer, but one that spreads faster than any biological mechanism."

Damn but that girl is fast. You knew she was, but watching her work is a treat.

Oscar and Jordy must be thinking the same thing because they're crowding around her.

"This is…" Jordy shakes his head. "It's not a cancer either."

"Biologic," Oscar said.

"Yeah, I'm thinking something like a virus. Look, it's sucking up cycles copying itself. Each copy eats more cycles to copy _itself_ , and then the copies…"

"Damn that's simple," Oscar agrees. "Cleaning this up is going to be a bitch, though. We have to make sure we got every single one."

"Disconnect the computers first," Liberty says.

"Faster to do them all at once."

"Better to make sure it's all gone rather than leave a piece somewhere to start again," Liberty replied. "First, isolate the possible sources of infection."

"You want us to create…cyber weapons?" Jordy asks, looking up at you. "I'm not sure I can get behind that."

"I want you to come up with defenses," your reply. "Right now, security is mostly physical, geared towards preventing unauthorized access. Gateway security is good, quite good, at preventing unauthorized access. The problem is that once someone has that access, they're in, and there is damn little to stop anyone with malicious intent. We're fortunate that most people don't realize, or at least understand, the potential damage that can be done with that kind of access. I want programs that will detect shit like this and stomp it flat before it takes root. I want programs that will prevent someone on one computer from infesting another. I want you to come up with as many attacks as possible, and find ways to protect against them, and when someone _does_ pull something like this off, I want you to rip it apart and create a solution. Instead of one level of access, I want you to create tiered gateways that not only give progressing degrees of access, but be able to compartmentalize networks so that only those working on a project can access that project."

"Just the three of us?" Oscar asked.

"To start. I have funds—" actually what you have are years-old memories of the exchange markets, and an AI that you know is loyal to you. Your pockets aren't nearly deep as Schnee's, and certainly not enough to do what you want…not on their own and not yet anyway. "—which can be drawn upon. Figure out what you want, and what you need, and then talk to Flattery since she's going to be running the business."

"And us?" Bull asks impatiently.

"One moment." You turn to Flattery. "Hopefully this will run in the black, but I can handle it if it isn't too far in the red, for a little while at least."

She nods slowly.

"You'll need to plow some back into it to grow. On their own Oscar, Liberty, and Jordy aren't enough to develop a marketable product. But what I'm really hoping is that this will turn into a revenue generator because the other half is just going to eat funds."

"What 'other half?'" Oscar asked. "I mean, this is pretty big…"

"Why didn't satellites work?"

"Because Dust loses its energy-carrying capacity outside the atmosphere." Angie Orr is a human woman in her late forties with orange hair worn long and a white lab coat. "The rockets we used weren't able to achieve escape velocity before the Dust gave out."

"I want to resurrect the satellite program," I said. "Power in orbit is going to have to be either solar-capture or beamed somehow, or possibly batteries, and orbital injection propellant is going to have to be compressed gas unless you can come up with something fancy."

"Which doesn't solve the Remnant-to-Orbit problem," she said.

"For that we have Jasper Bull, and Slater Coal." You turn to the others. Slater you know only by reputation. You'd worked with his son's team a few times, and knew that he'd been ruined by the SDC. You also know that he'd supported his family selling Dust, but that hadn't been his pation..

"Jasper Bull is an expert in ballistic engineering."

"I am _the_ expert in ballistic engineering," he corrected.

"And he is going to build us a gun capable of launching a satellite to orbit. Or at least high enough and fast enough that it can make orbital insertion under its own thrust."

"He is?" Angie asked.

"I am?" Jasper asked at the same time.

"It can't be done," both said. "You'd destroy the satellite." "The range, the amount of Dust you'd need would be astronomical!"

"Nonetheless…"

"And that explains my presence," Slater Coal said.

"Who are you?" Jasper asked.

"Slater Coal. I'm an expert on Dust, particularly experimentation and formulation."

"That doesn't matter. It won't work. Satellites are inherently fragile things," Angie objected. "An explosion would tear it apart!"

"If I understand you correctly, the acceleration would be sharper than with a rocket," Slater said slowly. "But maybe the initial acceleration doesn't need to be as high. If we can keep the rate of bore-pressure increasing at a constant rate…"

"Multiple detonation chambers?" Bull asked.

"That or a slower burning Dust…or possibly instead of burn Dust using thunder Dust to power electro-magnetic drivers? Add on a short-duration rocket-booster that ignites after leaving the barrel? It'd only last a short time but it'd give an extra kick and maybe get us towards this orbital injection thing…"

"This is insane," Angie muttered. "We're going to need testing facilities. A working prototype capable of lofting a two-hundred-kilo payload at over eleven-thousand meters per second. And that's just a prototype! We're going to need to loft several _tons_ to be commercially viable."

"Near the equator would be best," Bull suggested. "Four hundred, possibly five hundred millimeter bore for the test article. At least a hundred calibers long. Place the package on a sabot…"

You have one other idea, but just springing it now would raise far too many questions. Instead you go over to a wall monitor and tap it on.

"One last member of our team," you say as my 'human' avatar appears. The room beyond me is anti-septic white, and sparsely furnished. A few paintings on the walls provide color, but that's it. In contrast, I am dark. Dark-skinned, dark hair worn close to the scalp. I'm wearing a blouse of deep red that brings out brown tones in my skin.

"Hi," I said cheerfully. "I'm Ametrine Chiaroscuro. I'll be working primarily with the cyber team, but handling any calculations the orbital team needs as well as functioning as Ms. Smith's assistant. I have a condition that largely limits me to a sealed environment, so this will likely be as close to physically meeting me you'll ever get. But as a result, I have a lot of time on my hands and excellent computer support. Since I mostly interact through computers I have plenty of personal reason for wanting both to make sure the data-network remains secure and operational, and that redundancy is added to the cross-continental communications network."

RWBY

"Combat Certification?" you ask.

"Your last certification is rather out of date," Ozpin replies.

"Actions in the field can be substituted in lieu—"

"It has been more than ten years since you were last in the field," Ozpin observes.

You glare at him because while he isn't exactly _wrong_ , he has twisted the facts into an utter untruth. Then you check your weapons. Last Dance is on your left thigh, from all appearance a cylinder perhaps a third of a meter long and three centimeters in diameter. On you right, a pistol that fires high velocity kinetic energy penetrators, with a pair of smoothbore barrels and a few other goodies strapped on.

But you've also learned some hard lessons over the years. You've learned that weapons can be lost or destroyed. You've learned a firearm without ammunition is only useful as a paperweight. You've learned that some kinds of attacks can go right through an aura. And you've learned that carrying not enough gear is often worse than too much (you can always ditch weight if need be).

Thus, the bodysuit with its light tactical armor outer layer, its environmentally-stabilized inner layer, and a middle layer embroidered with Dust matrixes. More Dust is worked into the metal plates of half-finger gloves, protecting the back of your hands and fingers to the first knuckle, as well as an armored palm. Your boots have metal shanks that accomplish the same thing, and they have a pop-out knife at the toe.

A half-dozen throwing knives, three Dust grenades, plus one smoke and one stunner, a vial of raw ground burn dust (and one of thunder) for truly desperate situations, a small block of apoclamite just in case you need to destroy a not-small building, a med-kit, hydration unit, and a pair of swords with a slight S-shaped curve.

If you need to go tactical you carry more. More still, if in different ways, for long duration patrols or heavy assault. But for a day hike through Forever Fall you should be more than adequately armed.

At least Ozpin isn't insisting on a full medical scan. Your weapons are only difficult to explain in comparison to what one of those would find.

You look out the side of the bullhead down at Forever Fall, holding onto the grab-bar with one hand as you fish out a pair of aviator shades. "How are we doing this?"

"Jump out," Ozpin advised. "I will monitor and initiate pickup once you have demonstrated sufficient proficiency."

You tuck them on so he can't see your eyes flash. "Alright then."

RWBY

There's a method to Beacon's madness. One you hadn't appreciated until well after the fact. Having huntsmen and huntresses train against each other teaches very little in how to take on Grimm. Likewise, the creeps, beowolves, ursi, boarbatusks, and other assorted lesser Grimm pose very little danger to a graduate of any combat school, let alone a student at an academy such as Beacon. Their larger, more intelligent variants—ursa major, giant nevermore and the like—do pose a threat, but usually a manageable one. RWBY and JNPR engaging both a deathstalker and nevermore of such proportions was an outlier, especially during Initiation.

But even those unfortunate few examples serve to illustrate to students just how serious a business their chosen profession is. Frankly, you're surprised that the number who drop out are so low.

The Emerald Forest is usually left alone as a training ground, but frequent and repeated sweeps are made through Forever Fall. Partially training, but it's kept clear so that civilians can come to harvest sap.

A half-hour walk netted you one boarbatusk. A carefully-timed dodge to the right and your left foot struck out to catch it in mid-spin. It squealed as it ended up on its back and you drew Last Dance and triggered a plasma burst into its unprotected belly.

Ichor stained the fallen leaves, and then the husk began to slowly dissipate.

You're starting to consider calling in the bullhead when you catch sight of a lone beowolf. You go vertical, climbing a tree and following after. There's never just one beowolf…

Nor is there this time.

That said, you aren't used to seeing a pack the size of the one facing you.

There are at least four dozen of the things, _three_ of them the larger, smarter variety called 'Alphas', and at the edges of the clearing are vaguely humanoid creeps.

Last Dance stays in its sheath as you draw your sidearm and start with sequenced fire. One shot per step per second. Left hand cupping the right. You're tracking targets too fluidly for it to even really be called 'aiming', just point-click-move to the next target as each dart rips apart its target.

Sometimes another beowolf is so close behind the first that the dart rips apart both.

An Alpha is coming at you, all snarling maw and ripping claws.

There was a time you could have stuck your arm halfway down its muzzle and blown out the back of its head.

Time—and the chance to see what happens to young fools who place body parts in mouths of Grimm—has cured you of such temptations.

Instead you move inside its attack, left hand punching into its midriff as you slam the muzzle of your weapon into that spot between mandible and throat and stroke the trigger.

The torso of the beowolf flops back in a spray of ichor.

You're in the middle of them now and your left-hand drops and you draw Last Dance. Then it's a straight run, Last Dance shooting plasma bursts as your sidearm pumps out kinetic energy penetrators.

Last Dance will continue spitting out plasma as long as it has burn Dust, but the sidearm beeps and there is a faint warning tremble when you have only five rounds left. The beep is more pronounced as you dispatch a creep with the final round.

A flick of your thumb switches over to the first smoothbore barrel and the second Alpha swallows a fireball round. Ichor gouts from its maw a split-moment before its middle swells out and explodes. Another flick and you send a bolo-round at the last Alpha.

A projectile the size of your thumb spits at the beowolf. Its shape imparts a spin that both stabilizes it and releases sixteen heavy metal beads. Connecting the beads like an evil spider web is a thin, but very strong wire.

You give the beowolf a critical eye to make sure the bolo has it firmly ensnared as you step by, the tiny ratchet in the base projectile already clicking.

You holster your sidearm rather than try to reload in the middle of a fight. Then, both to show off and keep concealed what all Last Dance can do, you holster it as well and draw your swords.

Unlike Last Dance—but like your sidearm—you didn't name them. Mostly because in your mind Last Dance is your weapon. The swords and sidearm are just a piece of field gear. Granted, they are a piece of field gear that's only function is as a weapon, and the swords at least are independent of both Dust and ammunition. But their primary purpose is to kill Grimm. Against another huntress their strengths are perhaps more telling, but their limitations are also more profound, well past the point of hindrance. Thus, Last Dance.

But for killing Grimm, your swords work very well indeed.

Limbs and ichor fly as you slash into the remaining beowolves. Without an Alpha they've lost what little coordination they had…and there is none left alive with the wits to call it off.

Which was why you had slaughtered your way to the Alphas in the first place. Without that little bit of malicious intelligence none of the beowolves or creeps facing you will break off. Thus, none will live long enough to acquire that additional degree of smarts.

In fact, you don't really need to move into them. You could stand in place and play blender. But while Grimm dissipate quickly, they don't dissipate _immediately_ and you have to worry about tripping on severed limbs or slipping on ichor.

And you prefer a rigorous offense wherever possible.

It's a slaughter.

Where there had once been a clearing of green grass and red-gold leaves there is an uneven terrain of slowly fading Grimm.

There are a half-dozen creeps left and a flick of your wrists causes ichor to slip from your blades and you sheathe them.

You grab the first creep's wrist as it slashes at you, ducking under its reach. It howls and you back-kick into its exposed armpit with enough force to rip its arm free of its body. A series of kicks, knee-gut-shoulder-head, 'walk' you up the second using the toe-blades to anchor yourself, and then you come down elbow-first on the third. Most huntresses who have your time and experience can 'harden' their aura so instead of flesh and bone the strike hits like iron. Some can even impart additional energy, as though moving faster than normal and without using a semblance. You shape your aura, plaining it down to a razor's edge and when you strike it cleaves the creep in two as another back kick relieves creep #2 of its head. A knife-edged hand lashes out and #4's head leaps from its shoulders.

Suddenly you are almost oppressively _tired_ of the whole thing. This wasn't a fight, or even a test. It was a one-sided slaughter. And while utterly necessary, it also wasn't a spectator sport. You look up at the bullhead as you draw Last Dance from your left thigh.

Two plasma bursts and it's done.

RWBY

Ozpin gives you a level look as you board the bullhead. If he is put-off—or intrigued—by the slaughter he gives no sign.

You wordlessly hand over your scroll. He takes it, and equally wordlessly updates your credentials before handing it back.

Time to get to work.

"There's just one more test."

You gave him a baleful look.

"A medical exam."

Well fuck.


	4. Volume 1 Chapter 2 A Beacon Still Shines

**Disclaimer: You don't own RWBY, I don't own RWBY.**

* * *

"Close the door."

Ozpin hid a smile behind his mug. There were very few who would address him with that degree of imperial disregard, but Cynerick Namon was one of them.

The head of Beacon's medical wing, and its chief surgeon, continued at his computer for almost a minute before making a disgusted sound and stood.

"Another year. Another new class to make sure I'm ready to fix up when they start breaking themselves. I can always use a distraction this time of year, and this one you brought me a real piece of work."

"Oh?" Ozpin asked.

"For starters, she should be dead."

"I beg your pardon."

Namon got up and crossed to a wall panel. He gestured at it with his scroll and a full-sized image of Vala bar-Adama. He hit a control and she 'faded' until only a skeleton was left. "Looks normal, right?"

"These ribs—"

"Yeah, the seventh ribs are replacements, so are a dozen other bones," Namon said. "That's pretty unusual, but not exactly unheard of. But now look at this."

The image 'swam' in on the sternum until it lost definition, and then braided lines began to appear.

"What exactly am I looking at?" Ozpin asked.

"Bone, despite its appearance, isn't solid," the surgeon replied. "It's a dense, interwoven matrix of rigid fibrous tissue. That's to allow blood cells, platelets and the like to enter the bloodstream."

Ozpin said nothing but sipped his cocoa. Namon liked to reiterate what people knew, or perhaps that he expected they didn't know but should, as a way to lead into what they didn't know.

"Her bones are sheathed in a carbon nanotube matrix that is several layers deep. They don't appear to impede natural bone function, but it means her bones are effectively unbreakable and, on a positive note, she probably never has to worry about tooth decay."

"Extensive work. I wonder—"

"Oz," Namon said.

Ozpin looked at the doctor over his glasses.

"This is the most normal thing about her."

"You're joking."

"I wish." Namon touched a control and the skeleton faded out and was replaced with an outline of the central nervous system.

"Additions to her central nervous system?"

"If you can call it that. _This_ , up here in the brain and spreading down the spine?" Scattered throughout the ghost-grey image of what was clearly a brain and spinal cord were tiny, white, opaque nodules that were interconnected by fine white lines. "It looks sort of like a lymphoma spreading through her entire CNS, but it isn't. It's an extensive, and extremely invasive, cybernetic neuronetwork—a computer, basically."

"Like what is used to connect a cybernetic prosthetic?"

"No. Those you have a single interface that connects the tech to the bioware. Then the person has to learn how to use the new neural pathways, well, their pre-existing pathways plus the cybernetic equivalents. It's roughly the same as a stroke victim needing to relearn how to walk. This is…honestly, aside from what I'm looking at, I'm not sure what this is. I think it may have started as an attempt to heal trauma, there's some fairly extensive scarring along the parietal bones, including a complete replacement of the skull structure at two points with nodules of condensed circuitry directly underneath. If so, it was altered radically at some point. I think these…nodes, parallel down the spine, and at elbows and knees, are attachment points for some kind of…external cybernetic package."

"Her tactical suit?"

"No, that's unpowered. These actually break the surface of the skin which makes me think they're meant to physically dock with something. These disk-shaped objects in each palm are subcutaneous, but more normal network access nodes. Relatively normal, I should say. You don't see this kind of tech outside of Atlas. Even most of their civilians, the ones who could afford it I mean, don't have access to this kind of…body augmentation, and I don't think even their SpecForce soldiers have _two_ nodes."

He let that sink in for a moment, then turned back to the viewer and brought up another image. It pulled back, an empty dark-grey outline of a human forming around the ghost-grey nervous system and white cybernetics. A new setting of webbing appeared, sheathed inside the outline of the body, only this time in a riot of color. Red-orange-yellow swept down the holo's 'face', while blue wrapped around the sides of the head. A less dense web of green threaded down through the rest of the body. Lines of pink and purple and other hues swept through at various points. Dull-colored organs appeared, each thoroughly infiltrated by brighter webs and nodules.

"It's worth a stare or three, isn't it, Ozpin?"

"What _is_ this?"

"No idea," Namon said.

"Cynerick—"

"She wouldn't tell me," he replied. "Told me to figure it out for myself. I know Atlas can replace organs, at least some of them, with cybernetic replacements. This is both more invasive, I think it's infiltrated every organ in her body, but it's also a lot subtler. Most of the organs looked healthy enough. By which I mean, I didn't run every single test I could think up, but what I did run looked normal enough aside from all the body-mod. I also didn't suggest opening her up and looking under the hood."

"Probably an intelligent decision," Ozpin said.

"Yeah. That's what I thought." Namon shut off the wall panel, then sank onto the chair behind his desk. He pulled up a file, reaching up to rub his forehead as he read. "There's some other stuff that I _do_ know of. For example, she has an internal pharmaceutical dispensary loaded with stims, boosters, coagulants, and pain suppressors—most of it right off the controlled substance lists and a half dozen are not listed in any medical database I have access to. There is an endorphin generator, or at least what I think is an endorphin generator, and at least three organs I've never seen before—not cybernetic replacements either, actual biologic structures."

"What does this mean?"

Ozpin watched Namon sit in silence for a long moment. Then he lifted his hand and shook his head.

"I don't know, Oz. I just don't know. If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes I'd have told you that it was impossible. As far as I'm aware no one, not even Atlas, is working on actual biological replacement organs, much less…supplementary ones."

"Cynerick, your best guess, please."

"Best guess it is, then. You know how Atlas and to a lesser extent Mistral have been working on a way to produce huntsmen-equivalent—or even near-equivalent—warriors; in mass and without the years and years of training? This could be the human prototype for that. The two issues with that are: first, she'd be dead now if she _wasn't_ a huntress, and two, the tech to produce these mods is at best theoretical."

"Hmmm," Ozpin hummed. "Cynerick, your best guess please, how long would it take someone to develop something like this?"

"I don't know. Fifty years?" Namon shrugged. "To get it past all the trials and to the point where all of these might be attempted at once. If you wanted to crash-start and put them all in as soon as you think you have something and accept that you're probably going to kill your patient, maybe half that."

* * *

Flattery Smith shook her head. "This is going to get expensive fast."

"We knew it would," I replied. I have my 'Amy' avatar up and we're conversing by vid-conference in her office.

"I have a request to grow the number of personnel by a magnitude of ten; a new, custom-built facility; a foosball table; and hundreds of thousands of lien of new equipment. And that's just on the computer security side. They at least are preparing to offer a product or service. You don't want to know the budget Bull has come up with."

"Do it," I said with a shrug. "I'll get with Vala and authorize a fund transfer."

"No." Flattery shook her head again. "We can't keep doing this. There is a limit to how far into the red we can run."

"The limit of Vala's accounts. We're still good," I said. But only because I had started another business and had access to some day trading algorithms that wouldn't be created for years. Flattery was right about one thing. This was getting expensive fast. "But I take your point," I continued. "Options."

"We suspend the satellite program until the electronic security team starts to bring in money."

"Which they'll need to continue growth," I said.

"I thought the whole point was that they'd be a revenue-generator to cover the satellite program."

"In the long run, yes. But we need a viable alternative to the CCT in the short-term."

"Why?"

And that brought up the question of how much to tell who. "There's been chatter. Some terrorists see the CCT as a vulnerable target that can be used to boost their profile."

"Who?"

"Mistrali separatists, Valian Crown Loyalists who want to have a king again… Does it really matter? The point is, they're right. And if they succeed…"

"Inter-Kingdom communication goes dark," Flattery said. "For that matter, intra-Kingdom communication can become difficult. That would be…bad."

"Hence the satellite program."

Flattery frowned at me. "I still don't like this Ametrine."

"What's there to like?"

* * *

First Day as Beacon's newest teacher got you the shit detail of making sure all of the prospective students get shoved towards the ballroom. You hadn't even realized there was someone doing that. It had been really kind of easy to find. And…

And Jaune Arc is wandering around looking at buildings. Go figure.

Since it's pretty much a straight line from the airpads to the front gate to the Ballroom it sort of begs the question of how he got lost nearly a third of the way around campus but...it's Jaune Arc so maybe that explains everything and—

You stop dead in your tracks because what you're feeling cannot _possibly_ be right.

You knew Jaune hadn't known what his semblance was when he first came to Beacon, but that wasn't unheard of. Uncommon, yes. Unheard of, no. You also knew he'd cheated on the entrance exams or something similar, although you'd never gotten the complete story because by the time you learned it had happened in the first place, it was no longer relevant and you were too busy trying to stay alive.

But the Jaune Arc walking towards you didn't—does not? at some point you're going to have to sit down and write _Tenses for Time-Travelers_ —even have an activated aura. That…wasn't strictly impossible. What it was, was flat-out suicidal, and it meant that he had a lot less training than he'd implied when he'd talked about it.

A _lot_ less.

But he most definitely _did_ have an activated aura by the time you were fighting the deathstalker and nevermore so when did…

Pyrrha. It had to be. And his sword-and-shield were eerily similar to her fighting style (minus the mobility, the alternate modes of her weapon, and what her semblance allowed her to do), especially early on, which meant he got pretty good scary-fast. Maybe her moving his weapon and shield to program muscle memory?

The implications are staggering. Activating someone's aura isn't done lightly. It effectively takes touching their soul with your own, and there are all sorts of implications that go with that. It's pretty uncommon for close family members to activate each other's aura, for example. And for two people who were, however briefly, so intimately connected to continue fighting side-by-side? Especially right after it happening? And then for them to go on living in the same dorm room for most of a year?

No _wonder_ JNPR was so screwed up after Pyrrha's death. It wasn't just the loss of a teammate no matter how beloved. Jaune must have felt like his soul was shredded. Which also explains why the reaction he had to Cinder was so out of proportion with Ren's and Nora's.

Do you activate it now or not? You can't give him the attention Pyrrha would. But…

Why would Ozpin accept him? He _had_ to know. No matter how good Jaune had cooked his entry exam or whatever, but…was that _why_ he had accepted Jaune? Had he _meant_ for Jaune to die in the Emerald Forest as some kind of object lesson?

Granted, it was one the students probably needed to learn but…

"Uh…hi?" he asks. "Can you tell me where—"

You point. Silently.

And let the opportunity pass you by.

* * *

You're standing on the balcony looking down at the maze of sleeping bags spread out over the floor of the ballroom. You're watching them all, but you have your eyes out on eight in particular and wondering: do all Huntresses and Huntsmen start out so broken, or were RWBY and JNPR special in that regard?

You spot Jaune first. Strutting around in his powder blue onesie, bravado masking insecurity and ignorance. Now that you know he doesn't have an activated aura you are back where you were earlier. What drove him to get into Beacon? What does he hope to accomplish? Questions that, by the time you knew him well enough to ask, you were more concerned about staying alive and ripping out Salem's heart…not necessarily in that order. But normally, coming to a place like Beacon, with no aura or training, would simply be an exotic way to commit suicide. Anyone smart enough to lie their way in would know that. And that's not good because you had been counting on Jaune being one of the mentally healthiest of your old friends.

Blake, sitting by herself in one corner is almost as easy to find as Jaune. Is she aware that she instinctively found a place that protected her back, and gave her plenty of room—and people—between herself and conventional entrances (and windows) but with easy access to an exit those in her immediate vicinity (the balcony) couldn't use or at least wouldn't naturally think of? Whether she did or not, she is trying to convince herself she doesn't need a friend in the world other than her books, trying too hard to forget Adam, and not at all certain she'd be where she was if he'd been more…selective in his targets.

And utterly confused about who she is and what she should be doing, can't forget that. There's more to that bow than not wanting attention, else she wouldn't have worn it when she was still slumming with the Fang.

Nora is chatting away at full-throttle. No guesswork there. She's terrified at the idea of being on a different team from, partnered with a different person than, Ren. Those fears are easy compared to the terror of facing the next four years without him should one of them fail initiation. But underlying it is the belief that Ren is the only person who will ever care about her. Her bubbly personality masks a lot of residual pain from her youth, and a subconscious belief that sooner or later everyone she's close to except Ren will abandon her.

Ren is next to her, sitting on top of his bag, meditating. No guesswork there either. He shares many of his best friend's fears. But he protects himself by seeking a kind of mental calmness—or perhaps nothingness—where memories and fears cannot hurt him. And yet, he finds Nora's incessant chatter to be soothing. He's worried for her, and for himself without her. At this point neither have anything except their weapons, their Huntsmen-trainee licenses, and each other. Initiation and the potential for them to fail—or worse, one of them to pass and the other fail—threatens all three.

You find Ruby writing to the friends she left behind and will likely never see again. Alone, uncertain of the future that's been suddenly thrust on her, and her mother's ghost haunting her footsteps. She isn't actively suicidal, but there's a lack of concern—or maybe more accurately a _subordinating_ of concern—for her own wellbeing that is decidedly unhealthy for a huntress to have. Summer Rose has left her an impossible role-model, and Ruby believes—believes _hard_ —in the myth of huntsmen and huntresses, with very little understanding of the reality. She is completely unaware of her own potential…or that the enemies she doesn't know she has would do a great deal to keep her unaware. Permanently. And she relies too heavily on her semblance and Crimson Rose to make up for the critical defects in her fighting style.

Yang chatting with Ruby while leering at the boys, her own insecurities regarding her mother not nearly as under control as she likes to tell herself, and burying her family's need for her to be their caretaker behind jokes and an outlook just shy of cynical. Ruby might not care about her own mortality, but so much of Yang, from her family life, to her fighting style, to how she 'relaxes' is borderline self-destructive. She will give all of herself to those she cares about and hold nothing back for herself. Her combat technique relies far too heavily on her semblance, on _taking_ hits. And as for her downtime! She seeks a life of excitement and adventure, unaware of or perhaps ignoring the misery that pervades that life, but at the same time she craves the stability she gave her family but that she herself lacked.

Weiss pretending to be all-knowing and perfect, immaculate, the very image of Schnee while trying to surreptitiously observe the other boys and girls to figure out how the sleeping bag works. Not fully aware of just how far her family has fallen, yet determined to lift it up. Her mask is better than the others. JNPR are at least self-aware and Ruby hasn't learned to hide who she is yet, Yang is all bravado and Blake uncertain over who she is, but Weiss almost believes herself to be the person she shows the world. You have to hand it to Old Man Schnee. That icy statue of a real person is an expert duelist and an excellent businesswoman, but underneath is an emotional cripple with far too little understanding of the 'real world'.

It takes you longer to spot Pyrrha, and you wonder if that was intentional on her part or not. A part of her is justifiably proud of her accomplishments and craves recognition for them, but she drowns under the idolization—if not deification—those accomplishments have brought her instead. Now more than anything she wants to blend into the background of students, to be a face in the crowd, and maybe that would have been possible as a civilian but not as a huntress-in-training. And trying will only get somebody killed.

Again.

You wonder if any of them truly realize how desperately unhappy they are. You know you didn't, not even after you found a team. It was only after your world had been dragged back down that you understood just how special the next year was…will be? You make a note to ask Glynda what is the proper tense for talking about future events that have already happened in your past.

It didn't start with Pyrrha's death, but it'd be easy to say it did.

Jaune took that one hard. You all did, but having met him you understand Jaune's reaction so much better. And the sad thing is that, right now, you aren't certain if you want to save her. Will she make JNPR stronger? Or is it in losing her that all of you make the transitions from children playing at huntsmen and huntresses to actually doing the job? Will they make the change with her? _Can_ they? And if they can't, what will you do?

One thing is for certain. None of them are looking up.

Granted, Beacon is supposed to be a safe place. A place where you can let your guard down. But the only reason you are still alive is because even when you were in some place secure, you kept one ear out, one eye open, and your weapons close at hand.

And you _always_ checked your six, and made sure someone was looking _up_.

You smirk suddenly. Dropping a couple of noisemakers and flashbangs into the party sounds like all sorts of fun…but tomorrow.

"Ah, our new colleague. Surveying our young protégé's already?"

You turn. Seeing Oobleck alive is no great shock. Not compared to the others you've had recently. But Port… The last time you saw Port he was a wane, drawn caricature of the jolly, _portly_ man standing in front of you. Something in his friend's death had broken him in a way that Salem and all the horrors of Grimm had never managed to accomplish.

You plaster on a smile. "Something like that anyway. Vala bar-Adama."

"I am Professor Peter Port. And this is Professor Bartholomew Oobleck."

" _Doctor_ Oobleck," you both say.

Oobleck does the impossible and actually pauses while Port laughs loudly.

"I was warned," you add.

* * *

You don't watch Initiation. Either you haven't made any changes so there's nothing for you to do…or your presence has been changed enough and there's…nothing you can do except watch. Whatever concerns you had last night about whether or not to activate Jaune's aura or eventually saving Pyrrha, you don't want to watch any of your friends—or yourself for that matter—get torn into bloody pieces and/or eaten if you've managed to screw things up.

Or at least it hadn't been your intention to watch Initiation.

Somehow you found yourself on the cliff overlooking the ruins watching as RWBY and JNPR fight a giant nevermore and an equally large deathstalker while Ozpin sips from a mug.

"Impressive."

Only in that you all lived through it. You were far too lucky. More so than any of you deserved.

"We do not interfere."

"Hadn't been planning on it," you say. It's not quite a lie. You hadn't planned to, but you fully intended to be ready to do so. Just in case, of course. "Did you plan for Jaune Arc to be killed?"

"I never plan for any of my prospective students to be killed during Initiation."

"Uh-huh. Maybe you didn't set him up to die. But you didn't expect him to live through this either."

He gives you a long look and you wonder if he's going to be forthcoming with you. Then you wonder if he's going to be honest.

"Jaune Arc managed to put together a falsified application that managed to get through our entire screening process. Even Professor Goodwitch does not realize it. That is not something done easily, quickly, or without a great deal of thought. If Mr. Arc is capable of all of that he is certainly capable of anticipating his chances of graduating."

Jaune managed to get past _Goodwitch_? Serious props, that is. What you say is: "Living to graduate."

"That _would_ be required for him to graduate, would it not?" Ozpin sips at his cocoa. "Who am I to stand in his way?"

"The Headmaster of Beacon Academy?" You offer.

"Nevertheless." Ozpin sips from his mug again. "Ours is an unsafe profession. If a crippling injury, or even a death, is necessary to make that clear, better for all that lesson comes early. Hence, the rule not to interfere."

RWBY's figured out what it wants to do about the nevermore and it looks like JNPR is well on its way to dealing with the deathstalker.

You pull out your scroll and begin filming as Ruby comes shooting over the lip of the cliff with the head of a giant nevermore.

She lands, all in the moment. Pleased, proud, maybe a little arrogant in the moment of her biggest kill to-date. Then it's gone. "Professor! I, uh, didn't see you."

You shake your head. "Get your team up here. Quickly now."

She turns and strides to the cliff edge. If she caught your slip she didn't say anything.

Weiss did this neat glyph-thing that Ruby had sort-of seen her do while jumping through the falling-apart temple and she, Blake, and Yang came jumping up a series of them like they were giant stairs.

"Yang!"

"Great job, Sis," Yang said, throwing an arm around her.

"Gah! Not the hair. Not the hair!" Ruby ducked out of her arm in a flurry of rose petals before Yang could grind knuckles into her scalp.

"Why, exactly, are we up here?" Weiss asked stiffly.

"I thought you'd like a group photo."

Ruby spun to find the blue-haired professor standing behind them.

"Excuse me?" Weiss asked. "And who are you, exactly?"

"Professor Vala bar-Adama," she replied evenly. "You won't have heard of me."

"Let's do this," Yang said.

"But—" Blake's protests stop as Yang pulls her towards the head of the Grimm they had just killed.

"Hmm…" Yang gives it a push and rolls it right-side up. "That's better. Blake, you get on the left and—"

 _Oooh_ , awesome idea! Ruby darted up its beak to sit on top of its head.

"Yeah, like that. Now Ice Queen—"

"I'm not— _ahhh!_ Unhand me you, you _brute_."

Ruby stifled a giggle and scramble to peek over the edge of the nevermore's head—

" _Ahhh!_ "

—only to have to scramble back as Yang heaved Wiess at her.

Weiss thumped down, quickly pushed herself up into a sitting position and began brushing (mostly) imaginary dust off her combat skirt. "Your sister," she hissed, "is a menace."

Ruby shrugged since her partner sort of had a point, though not in the way she meant.

"Everyone find places!"

Ruby turned to find Professor bar-Adama waving her scroll.

Yang and Blake were standing on either side of the head. Ruby held up two fingers on her right hand in the shape of a 'V' because, hey, they were victorious, and with her left she reached over and pulled Weiss close. Weiss went all stiff and…ice-like.

"C'mon, Weiss. Smile."

She gave Ruby a look. What little warmth that was in it wasn't the good kind.

"Weiss," Ruby said, quickly tucking her cloak in close to ward off the chill before throwing up her 'victory' sign again. "We killed a giant nevermore. And We. Were. _Awesome!_ "

A crack split Weiss face. It started tiny, but grew into a hesitant smile. "We kind of were, weren't we?"

"We totally were," Yang crowed.

"Agreed," Blake said.

Weiss was smiling by the time the Professor's scroll flashed to indicate it had taken a pic.

She fiddled with it a moment, and then all of their scrolls beeped. Ruby pulled hers out and activated it to find their first team photo.

"Best. Team. _Ever_."

"We performed adequately," Weiss said.

"Adequately?" Blake asked.

"Who talks like that?" Yang asked.

"A deathstalker has more natural weapons," Weiss said.

"The nevermore was the more elusive target."

"A nevermore has a single-point source failure for locomotion. A deathstalker has multiple and redundant legs."

"Wait," Ruby said, frowning at Weiss, then at Blake, the back at Weiss. "Weiss, dearly beloved partner—"

Yang gagged and Ruby made a rude gesture that she was pretty sure Yang didn't know that she knew.

"—are you arguing that Jaune and Team Castle had the harder target?"

"No!" Weiss glared at all of them, then: "Don't ever hug me again."

Ruby gave her a look. "Nope," she said, popping the 'P'.

"Excuse me?" she asked.

"I said: _Nope_ ," Ruby gave the 'P' an extra pop just to be clear.

"Yeah…that's not going to happen," Yang said. "Sorry Ice Queen."

For a moment Ruby thought Weiss might give up Beacon and she almost started to say that it was okay if she didn't want hugs but then she shivered. "One per month."

"Per day?" Ruby asked.

Weiss grimaced. "One a week, with prior notification."

Okay, so they were negotiating. Ruby could do this. Blake looked amused and Yang was grinning.

"Um…three per week, one with notice and two sp-spon-span? Um…without notice."

"Two per week, with prior notice," Weiss said, her eyes were narrowing which Ruby was starting to think was not a good sign so…

"Two per week, with notice. Unless there's some big celebratory thing that warrants a hug which'll serve as notice and doesn't count against the two."

Weiss eye twitched. "Big celebratory thing?"

"Like killing a giant nevermore?"

Huff. "Fine." Beat. "But you already hugged me for killing the nevermore."

Ruby shrugged. "Okay." She leaned over and hugged Weiss again.

" _Gahh!_ What did I just say?"

"That was for coming to an agreement and not fighting harder," Ruby grinned.

Yang's scroll beeped and she thumbed it.

"Ms. Xiao Long," Professor bar-Adama's—when had she disappeared and where had she gone to?—voice said. "There is a feast tonight to welcome everyone back to Beacon for the academic year. Attendance is mandatory. Teams and team leaders will be announced."

"Gotcha—"

"Before that event starts you will visit every classroom in Beacon, and every blackboard that does not already have something written on it you will fill with the following lines: _The world is full of Grimm that want to eat me. I will not aid them by jumping into their mouths._ "

"But…" Yang was staring at her scroll, then slowly looked up at Beacon. "But Beacon is huge…"

"Don't worry, Sis. I'll help."

"We all will," Blake said, turning to give Weiss an expectant look.

She huffed a little. "Fine."

They started walking.

"Team 'Castle'?" Weiss asked.

"Well, they got the gold castle relics," Ruby said. "It makes sense, two pairs of partners, two identical relics—"

"Chess pieces," Blake says.

" _Relics_ ," Ruby repeated. "It's just like a matching game."

"Of _course_ it is," Weiss sighed. "So…what are we then?"

"Team Pwny," Yang said, pulling out her relic and wagging it in the air.

"No."

"Yep."

"I refuse—"

"Totally are."

"Best. Team. _Ever_."

"Even got the names for it."

" _Excuse me?_ "

"We got us a Prodigy…"

"Yep!" Ruby chirped, popping the 'P'.

"Ice Witch—"

"I am _not_ —"

"The Nerd."

Did Blake _growl?_ That was sooo cute! But it was also her cue… "and Yang."

* * *

You'd expected that Professor Ozpin would want to have a longer discussion once he'd had a chance to look over the results of your medical 'exam,' and spend some time contemplating your field exercise. You had also expected that when he decided to have that discussion he'd 'invite' you to his office.

You did _not_ expect him to be sitting in a chair in your quarters after the welcoming feast.

"Did you find out what you wanted to know?" you ask.

"How much do you know?" he asks instead.

"Maidens. Relics. Salem…Old Man." He doesn't so much as raise an eyebrow so you roll your eyes. "'And the Shadow fell upon the land, and the world was riven stone from stone. The oceans fled, and the mountains were swallowed up, and the nations were scattered to the eight corners of the World. The moon was as blood, and the sun was as ashes. The seas boiled, and the living envied the dead. All was shattered, and all but memory lost, and one memory above all others, of him who brought the Shadow and the Breaking of the World.'"

"We lost, then."

"You lost."

He considers that for a time before nodding. "You don't like me."

"Like has very little to do with it."

"Trust me, then."

"It's more like… We had a difference of opinion, once," I said. "About what was the greater threat. You went with the one you've been fighting for the last six thousand years."

"And you did not," he observed. "Which of us was correct?"

"Both of us," you say. Oh how it _hurts_ to admit that. So much easier to blame him. It'd divided your friends when unity had been most needed.

It had gotten most of them killed

"Salem was able to wipe out the Kingdoms. Again, from what I understand of your history though we weren't exactly on speaking terms at the time. But she wasn't able to wipe us out. Humanity is sort of like cockroaches that way."

"And your threat?" he asked.

"Was able to succeed because Salem had gotten us to kill most of each other first. My turn."

He nods slightly.

"Why not ever teach it? You clearly are skilled enough to identify me by aura alone. Even through my shields. Goodwitch isn't."

"What makes you think I haven't tried?" he asks.

"Okay. Fair enough."

"How much of her current plans do you know?"

"Probably enough to seriously disrupt them. Especially if I were willing to embrace a high enough body-count. But doing so will only drive her back under. That's worthwhile in the short-term where our students and the civilians are concerned, but eventually she _will_ rise again."

"Yes. Most definitely."

"The thing is, _my_ threat, there are only two access points I know of, and one will never give in. Not to you, certainly not to me, and trying will only ruin him for future use."

"Against a threat such as you describe—"

"He's too valuable to your fight against Salem to lose," you say bluntly. "That leaves the second access point, and that won't show up for months. The good news is there are a couple of times when I might be able to access it. The bad news is that the one that is most likely to yield favorable results won't manifest until after Salem begins things for good."

"And you are convinced that disrupting her plans will result in you losing these…access points."

"Yes."

Ozpin nodded slightly. "Tell me about this threat."

"No," you reply.

"I can help. And I know something of tasks left unfinished."

"You probably can, and you certainly do," you agree. "But last time we broke the unity largely between…my generation and your allies. If I told you… You have one of those two access points, but even if you were able to succeed, and I think the odds are about even that you would, it would also damage, possibly even destroy, the unity of your little group. The benefits would be huge. But the cost…" you shake your head.

"Salem has always excelled at taking advantage of what divides humanity." Ozpin sighs, "so then there is nothing we can do?"

"The usual. Prepare. Gather forces. I've started some efforts to fix weaknesses in global communications that she was able to exploit. Unfortunately, we are under a time crunch, and even at the best of times such things are expensive. I don't suppose you dropped a thousand lien in a bank with compounding interest for a couple of centuries?"

"I have access to more than a little wealth, but throwing money at problems is seldom an outright cure."

"Eh. I know someone who favors high explosives. It depends on the problem I guess. In this case, it couldn't hurt."

"A point." Ozpin sips from his mug. Seriously, does the thing ever run out? "I can make some funds available. What else?"

"She is able to exploit the tensions between humans and faunus. I've got some ideas on how to…disrupt those tensions. I doubt I'll be able to repair them, but I might be able to make coopting them far more difficult. The thing is, if I do, are you prepared to move on them?"

"It would depend on what you bring me."

"Don't play games with me," you say, your voice flat. "It doesn't really matter what I bring. Are you prepared to throw your standing as a huntsman, as the Headmaster of Beacon, visibly behind an effort to heal the rift between humanity and faunus?"

There probably isn't a whole lot he hasn't seen, which is probably one of the reasons it's so hard to surprise him. But you just did it. And you didn't just shock him, you _hurt_ him. "Each reincarnation…changes me," he said softly, "Am I really so…cold in the future that you would think that I wouldn't?"

"Not cold," you disagree. "But you were always good as misdirection and distraction, and answering just enough to satisfy without answering. When you want to, anyway. And by the time such verbal maneuvering was past we were deep into threat prioritization…and the tensions Salem had exploited had been mostly used up."

"Well," Ozpin says after a while, "that makes me feel a little better about myself anyway. What about the Maidens?"

"Let me guess," you say dryly. "Spring."

He nods.

"Right now, your, both side's, inability to find her is keeping her safe. If you suddenly stop looking, or worse, attempt a retrieval—"

"It will lead Salem to her," Ozpin finishes. "Understood. I don't like it, mind, but I understand your reasoning." He gives you a considering look. "Why did you ask me about Mr. Arc? You clearly know him well, so it seems likely he more than merely survived your Initiation."

You shrug. "I was curious. There was a lot of stuff you did that never really made sense but worked out in the long-run. Considering how…optimistic we all were, a splash of reality would not be amiss."

"Fair enough. Is there anything else I should know?"

"That's a good question, Ozpin," you reply. "A really good question. Okay, yeah. Your organization is compromised."

"What?" you've seen Ozpin shocked, no you have an opportunity to see him…icy. It's, yeah, more than a little frightening and it isn't even aimed at you.

"Lionheart."

Ozpin looks at you silently except to sip from his mug once more. "That too is unfortunate. You are telling me this because you want to leave him in place rather than risk my finding it out on my own and moving to…retire him."

"Yes," you reply. "He may be operating under duress, if so, flipping him back may be beneficial. Even if not, better the spy we know about than the one we do not. And this gives us the opportunity to make use of him."

"Definitely a point worth considering."


	5. Volume 1, Chapter 3: Early Lessons

**Disclaimer:** You still do not own RWBY, mores the pity that neither do I

* * *

"Team Leader Briefing?" Ruby asked.

"Exactly what it sounds like," you reply.

"Okay, so…what do I need to know?"

"Prep your scroll to receive a file transfer and put it on the desk."

Ruby does so, but she keeps it open so she can see just what you're sending her. Smart girl. "Wait, are these…are these _medical_ records?"

"You are responsible for your team," you reply. "That includes making major medical decisions in event of traumatic injury, and responsibility for notification of next-of-kin in the event of a fatal casualty. You have full access to their implants…"

The standard implant—which was nowhere near as widespread as its name implied—could monitor and transmit basic medical data, which was why they were common equipment for everyone from extreme-sports enthusiasts to emergency medical crews. The ones used by huntsmen and huntresses were also the monitoring point for aura as well as an emergency locator beacon. The former was how Glynda was able to track your aura in class, or the Vytal Tournament. The latter was mostly used to find the remains of dead huntsmen and huntresses.

It was pretty common to carry a couple extra for use in emergencies, which is how you'd had a dozen that were, like the rest of your stuff, far better than what was available in the here-and-now. It had been a non-trivial exercise for you to make sure that the future members of JNPR and RWBY received eight of them. And it had been an utterly trivial exercise for _me_ to make sure that only those whose scrolls had updated permissions received that additional data.

"Their medical and personnel files, and mental health evaluations." You touch your scroll to transfer more files. "Scholastic records. Combat School transcripts for yourself and Ms. Xiao Long. The reports from Ms. Schnee's personal trainers and test scores, and the results of Ms. Belladonna's field evaluation. You will have access to class performance and ranking, and are responsible for helping them choose future courses to ensure that RWBY retains a proper mix of skills _and_ that each is a well-rounded huntress upon graduation."

Ruby's eyes have gone very wide, but you pretend not to notice as you transfer another set of files.

"You have fiduciary responsibility—"

"Fiduciary?"

You pause and this time give her a direct look. "Hunting is a business, Ms. Rose. Those hiring Beacon teams get a discount. Beacon is compensated for material cost, and then Beacon takes a substantial cut, with the remainder split between team members and any staff involved. The exact portions of the split depend on the nature of the mission. You are responsible for the investment and disbursement of funds awarded to your team, but also team-centric costs."

"What about tactics? Team attacks and stuff?" Ruby asked nervously.

You raise one eyebrow. "I thought that went without saying."

"Oh…"

She looks overwhelmed and you let her sit for a moment. Last time Ozpin went over what was expected of first-term team leaders and it wasn't a fraction of what you'd just thrown at her.

Without a better understanding of what Salem's actual plans are, you can't count on being able to disrupt them. Disrupt those you know about, yes. But she _has_ to have enough slack built into the plans that she can afford some disruption and still have them come off. For that matter, her contingency plans could have the same effect or even worse. And those you don't have enough information to get at those.

That being the case, your only option is to get behind the students at Beacon and push as hard as you possibly can without breaking them. And since you know RWBY and JNPR better than any of the others, they're the ones who you're going to push hardest.

You make a sound to draw Ruby's attention and then look pointedly at a clock. "We have a little time left. Let's go over your team's scholastic standings and we can schedule another appointment to address other topics."

"But…"

"Relax," you advise. "This isn't something we are going to get through in one or two conversations."

"Oh." Pause. "Okay then…"

"Ms. Belladonna," you say, sitting back as Ruby recovers her scroll. She fiddles around for a moment before finding the appropriate report. "Very little formal records. Not surprising as she grew up beyond the Wall. But it also means we don't know where she is ahead or behind. The scores on her entrance exams were mixed. Some, especially those dealing with theory, were quite good. She placed well in advance in some areas, but behind in others."

"What does that mean?" Ruby asked, staring at her scroll.

"At a guess? It could indicate that she is largely self-taught. Those that are self-motivated to go out and acquire knowledge for themselves at her age are fairly uncommon if not rare. It would be natural for her to study topics that she finds interesting or compelling and neglect those she finds less appealing."

Of course, you have the advantage of not needing to guess at all, but Ruby doesn't need to know that yet. Possibly not ever.

"What else could it mean?"

You give Ruby a smile and nod. "It could be that her instruction was spotty. Or that something prevented her from doing well in those areas. In any of those cases, formal, structured education is likely to be something she does not have much experience with."

"Okay?" Ruby asks uncertainly. "What about Weiss?"

"Ms. Schnee's records are very complete. Home schooled, individualized instruction. As you can see her education is even more spotty than Ms. Belladonna's. The history of Atlas was covered in great detail, but little on the cultures of the other kingdoms, and none at all on the history or culture of faunus populations. In a way, she has many of the same problems as Ms. Belladonna because while she is used to structured education, it is _individual_ instruction, not as part of a group."

"That's important?" Ruby asked.

You give her a pointed look. "With individual instruction, a teacher can move at the student's pace, making sure they have full understanding before moving on. Also, they can structure a lesson to fit the student's method of learning. Instructing multiple people means moving slower than someone who immediately grasps a concept, but faster than someone who struggles, and lessons need to reach as many in the class as possible. And just because a person excels one day does not mean that they won't struggle the next."

"Okay…Yang?"

"Ms. Xiao Long. Ahead of most of her class at Signal in combat courses, but lags scholastically. She has a tendency to coast, to do just enough not to be held back."

"Yeah. That sounds like Yang all right," Ruby muttered. "What about…what about me?"

"Ruby Rose. Her grades in her year were fair for most academic subjects. Passed every armory course offered with flying colors. Early combat scores were dismal until she created a combination sniper-rifle scythe…you _do_ know that a scythe is one of the most dangerous weapons ever created?"

"Er, it may have been mentioned?" Ruby asks.

"Do you know why it's called that?"

"Um…no?"

You shake your head fractionally and look down at your scroll once more. "Because of the sheer number of people who've gotten killed or maimed trying to learn how to use one…or killed or maimed by someone else trying to learn how to use one."

"Oh."

You watch her face fall at that, but you only give her a moment before continuing. "Your distance scores need some improving."

Ruby doesn't reply.

"Accepted into Beacon based on combat proficiency in the field," you look up. "It means you didn't have to take the written tests. But it also means your fundamental knowledge base is almost two years behind your classmates. Beacon will not slow down for you. And while there is no need to acquire that knowledge per se, you will certainly not be tested on it, it is foundational. That is, what you will be learning will build upon knowledge that your classmates have…and you do not."

* * *

Blake watched Weiss walk away.

Their first class could have gone better, but it was hardly a disaster. Ruby had correctly identified that the boarbatusk's back was just as strong as the prominently armored face, but that it's belly was vulnerable. Either she had known that already, or she had picked it out from their Professor's rather bombastic story while at the same time drawing caricatures. And once the vulnerability had been identified, Weiss had been very precise in exploiting it. Actually, Blake decided on reflection, it had gone rather well…up until Weiss tore into Ruby and walked away.

She wore her outrage well, Blake thought darkly. The spine stiff, nose upturned as though the miasma chocolate chip peanut butter cookies around Ruby was the most disgusting thing she could smell. And yet…

As she disappeared around a corner, Blake couldn't help but compare her rather hasty departure to similar departures she herself had made.

"Geez, what crawled up her skirt and—"

"Yang."

Blake turned, wondering if she was watching partner and leader, or big sister/little sister.

"I just—"

"Yang," Ruby repeated.

"You're upset."

Blake nodded in silent agreement.

"I'm _confused_ ," Ruby said. "That girl wasn't at Initiation, so what was she doing in our class?"

"Who?" Yang asked, surprised by the non sequitur.

"Two rows up and across the aisle," Ruby said. "Brown hair, strong accent, faunus."

"Bunny ears?"

Blake managed not to wince.

"Hare, I think," Ruby said, giving Blake a quick look, but then just as quickly turning back to Yang.

"I don't know, Rubes. There were three waves. Maybe she was in one of them?" Yang suggested.

Ruby shook her head. "Professor Ozpin announced all the teams, though. I don't remember her on stage, and I'm sure I would have remembered if one of the teams announced had a member missing. I suppose she could have been one of the ones who didn't collect a relic…"

"She obviously passed Initiation. She wouldn't be in class if she didn't."

Blake frowned. There had been a number of faunus and she'd kept careful track of them. In the near term, she was more likely to be revealed by one of them, or perhaps a member of the staff, than anyone else. In the long term…she had planned on telling her team eventually, but that had been before Weiss Schnee had ended up on the same te—

"Blake?"

"Sorry," she said quickly. "You were saying?"

"We thought we'd lost you for a second," Yang said.

"Oh. No. I don't recall seeing her."

"I think she's an upper year," Ruby said. "And that makes it weird she's in our class."

Blake remained silent. It wasn't hard to see where this was going. The question was, how did Ruby know—

"I'll ask," Yang offered.

"Thanks, Yang."

"About Weiss—"

"Weiss is my partner," Ruby said.

"Fine," Yang said after a moment. "If that's how you want to play it. I'll catch you later."

Blake trailed after Yang. "Why'd you volunteer?"

Yang shrugged. "Ruby is…well, shy. If you just throw her in, she's fine, or start up a conversation about weapons. Otherwise she's…let's call it socially awkward and leave it at that."

"Not the type to seek out a stranger," Blake said.

"If she has to, she will. Fortunately, she now has minions."

Blake smiled slightly. "I'll talk to her."

Yang looked at her.

"Have you ever been to Vacuo?" Blake asked.

"Nooo," Yang said slowly. "Is that what that accent is?"

"Nomad accent. From out in the sand sea."

"You aren't from Vacuo," Yang said.

"No," Blake agreed.

"Then how do you know that."

And answering that would mean… "I read," she said instead. "Go make sure Ruby is alright."

"Gotcha. Thanks."

* * *

It was easy enough to track the girl to the library. Blake had misgivings about her first 'mission' being an ambush—even if only for information—in the sanctity of a book repository, but hopefully the same thing that comforted her would do the same for her targ—uh, quarry? She rolled the noun around in her mouth and decided it would do for the moment, then turned to how to best approach her…

"Hello."

The other girl startled, not necessarily the safest thing to do around huntresses, even those in training. "Er, hello?"

"I'm Blake," Blake said.

"Velvet," the other girl said in a thick Vacuo—deep, rural Vacuo at that—accent. "Why, um…"

"We didn't see you at Initiation and my team leader got curious," Blake said.

"And sent you to ask," Velvet said, and from the way her shoulders eased and the small smile, she was relaxing. "You shouldn't let her push you around."

Blake blinked. "That's actually the last…" she gave a quick shake of her head. "Ruby's fifteen. My partner is her older sister. Talking to you is an excuse to clear the area."'

Velvet stared at her. After a moment she giggled, which turned into a throaty laugh. "Oh. My. I have six sibs of my own so I can commiserate. Wait, did you say she was fifteen?"

"She's good enough, I guess," Blake said. "I've never met a scythe user before so I don't know how well I can judge. She must have done something to impress. Professor Ozpin doesn't strike me as the person who would let someone in if he didn't think they were qualified.

"Anyway, as I was saying, none of us recall seeing you at Initiation."

"Oh, you wouldn't have," Velvet said. "Team CVFY is second-year."

"But then…" Blake trailed off, not sure how to frame the question she wanted to ask.

"Why am I in your intro to modern history class?" Velvet asked.

"Uh, yeah. Pretty much."

"Well, it's not exactly a secret, but it really isn't brought up to team leaders until second semester," Velvet replied.

"What isn't?"

"How classes function," Velvet said distractedly. "Look, there's my team. Come on, we'll explain."

Blake followed Velvet to a nook where a girl sat on one side of a couch, a boy was sprawled in a chair, and a second boy sat on a cushion on the floor. Velvet took the other half of the couch, and Blake found herself waved into another chair as Velvet made introductions.

Yatsuhashi, Velvet's partner, was a giant. Even sitting on the floor, he was of height with the others. Fox, the boy sprawled in the chair, had copper-toned skin and, Blake was surprised to see, he was blind. Coco Adel, their leader, reminded Blake strongly of Weiss, though one obsessed with fashion rather than Dust, and without the Schnee arrogance.

"Velvet, has this person been bothering you?"

Coco's tone reminded Blake of Yang's protectiveness towards Ruby. It managed to be light, almost teasing, but with a subtle—though not quite malicious—threat. Blake noted the hand that reached down to stroke the designer handbag next to the couch. There was something in that gesture that made Blake think it was far more than a case of a non-uniform accessory such as Ruby's cloak.

"No. Blake was wondering about classes," Velvet said.

"Oh."

"It's not hard," Fox said lazily. "You have the list of what credits and field work you need to graduate. So long as you check everything off the professors don't really care _when_ you take a course."

"Except Professor Goodwitch," Yatsuhashi said.

"Okay, yeah, point. Professor Goodwitch gets in a snit if you skip her class."

"Combat training is mandatory," Coco said. "The others, not so much."

"Then how do you get something checked off if you don't take it?"

"You can test out of pretty much anything," Coco replied. "For that matter, there are some advanced courses that can only be taken if you test out of lower level courses. There just isn't time to both get their higher-level prerequisites signed off and take those courses otherwise."

"And individual lectures are often offered more than once," Velvet said.

"They are? That doesn't make sense."

"It does once a weekend mission shadowing a sheriff of a 'sleepy village' outside the Kingdom turns into a two-week running battle with raiders, a rescue op, and supply convoy escort, and then you get back to find that you're still on the hook for those two weeks of classes," Fox said.

"You pick up some of this when you have to register for your second semester classes," Coco said. "But I didn't get the full explanation until this year."

"I wonder why that is," Blake murmured.

"Probably some first-year team found out and overworked themselves trying to be the 'best team ever,'" Fox replied.

Coco rolled her eyes over the rim of her glasses. "Normally I'd tell you to ignore him. Fox is determined to get by on as little, what he calls 'real work,' as possible. But…he's probably not wrong."

"Is it too late to formally change classes, or do we just have to show up?" Blake asked.

"Don't say we didn't warn you," Fox said.

"You have to register any changes with Professor Goodwitch by the end of the second week of term," Coco replied. "Combat training with your year-group is still mandatory, though."

"Oh."

"You have another question," Yatsuhashi observed.

"Um?" Blake asked. "Well, yes. I was wondering why Velvet is in my intro history course. It was what started this whole conversation, really."

"Oh. That," Velvet laughed. "There was a visiting professor teaching the first semester of last year. I took a course he offered and didn't learn until later about lessons being offered at multiple times."

"Why not test out?" Blake asked.

"I could," Velvet said. "I'd hesitate to borrow what Fox calls notes—"

"Hey."

"—but I could use Coco's or Yatsuhashi's. There isn't really anything else offered at the time slot we go to that I'm particularly interested in or need, and I want to keep in practice for next semester. Dr. Oobleck, as you may have noticed, takes a little getting used to. His assignments are much the same."

* * *

The problem with having only elective courses is that there is no way to ensure that any particular student would have a reason to spend time with you. But if you insist each student sees you at least once, you can find ways to make those you want to see have cause to see you again, while subtly discouraging those who would be a…less than productive use of your time.

Is it fair? Not hardly. But you aren't in the business of being fair. Too many of those faceless huntsmen and huntresses in training are either Grimm fodder or manage to do well enough without you. Maybe you can change that, give them a better shot, and maybe that will have a positive impact on the whole damn thing. No, scratch that, it would definitely make a difference.

But as a Huntress your duty isn't to the others in your profession. It isn't even to the positive impact they can have. It is to all of the civilians in the world. The people who are unable—regardless of reason—of defending themselves. And stopping Cinder, derailing Salem's plans, foiling Ironwood's irresponsible need to do 'something,' would have a much larger impact than what those masses of barely formed huntsmen and huntresses might accomplish.

It is, perhaps, a pretty justification to concentrate on those you care about most. That doesn't make it wrong, however.

You decide to start with Weiss. You had to start somewhere and reverse alphabetical by first name is as good as alphabetical by last or simply picking names from a hat.

"You said you wanted to see me, Professor?" Weiss is all stiff and formal and prickly.

"I did. Yes."

"Your class is an elective; one I haven't even signed up for."

"True," you agree, saying nothing.

Weiss frowns at you.

That frown fades as she sips her drink.

Atlas lives on coffee. Even Ironwood drinks it though he tends to add…lubrication. Strictly for his shiny innards of course. The bitterness of their favored drink matched only by a continent that is frigid, both emotionally as well as physically, at its very best. Weiss' sweet tooth is carefully cultivated, hidden behind the cookie-munching Ruby Rose (or it will be) but it's still there. Your icebreaker is hot chocolate. It's Ozpin's actually, brewed hot, thick enough to stand a spoon in, and so dark it's bittersweet with just a hint of citrus—enough to make it fragrant without marring the taste.

"This school, is a resource, Weis," you say. "Everything in it, is a resource that you can use to make yourself a better huntress…or at least a longer-lived one."

She looks up at that.

"You do understand it is a dangerous profession?" you ask.

"Of course!"

"How many do you know have lived to retirement that aren't crippled?"

"They…weren't the kind of people Father approved of," she admits. "But I'm sure there must be some."

"Some," you agree, sipping your own drink.

"Some resources are obvious," you comment, "the weapon ranges, the library, the Dust magazine… Some are less so: Professor Port does a remarkable job describing various habits, strengths, and weaknesses of Grimm…if you can stay awake through, and parse them out of, his stories. Your partner, your team, your fellow teams, are additional resources that you can make use of or ignore."

"And I expect you are a resource as well?" Weiss asked.

You raise an eyebrow.

"What kind of resource?"

"What resource do you need me to be?" you reply.

"How about telling me how I explain to the man who controls, directly or indirectly, the vast majority of the world's Dust production and distribution that his daughter is not a team leader?" Weiss asked sarcastically. "How the Headmaster could choose someone like her as team-leader…"

Seriously? Did she not hear a thing—

Her voice trails off and you belatedly relax your glower.

"Better." Your voice is chill. You take a quick glance at the clock, and from when her class let out…it was possible, maybe even probable, that she hadn't talked with Port at all. "Why should he have?"

"What?" she demanded.

"Why should have Professor Ozpin made you team-leader?"

"Well because…"

You wait, content to give her the time she needs as she huffs up.

"I have more leadership experience."

"I see…" you nod slowly. "So, a finite resource, leadership experience, should go to the person who least needs it?"

Weiss glowers at you and grinds her teeth. "There is more to it than that. Tactics, logistics—"

"All of which any graduate is more than conversant in, regardless of whether or not they were team-leader."

"Respect," she snarls.

"You feel that only a team-leader is worthy of being respected?"

"I am Weiss Schnee," she says, avoiding the trap by not answering the question. "There are matters of image. Propriety."

"You stand to inherit one the largest fortune on Remnant," you remark. "For that matter, as heiress to the SDC you control one of the larger fortunes on Remnant. You need a lot more than being team-leader if you think your image is in jeopardy."

"Ruby is a child!"

"A child you are going to need to be able to trust and rely on if you hope to graduate with your limbs intact," you observe. "So far this is not a promising start to your partnership."

"I am—"

"A spoiled brat who is used to getting everything she wants?"

"That's not remotely true."

You nod slightly. "A spoiled brat who is used to getting anything she wants so long as her father can't be bothered to object?"

Weiss glowers at you, but there really isn't anything she can say to that.

"Okay, let me ask you this then. Is complaining about who your team leader is likely to change Professor Ozpin's mind? If, in your duties at the Schnee Dust Company, someone came up to you and told you that their team leader was…deficient, would you hand that person the leadership position?"

"Not without looking to see if the first person was truly deficient—but she _is!_ "

"Is she?" you ask. "Ruby has had the position less than 24 hours. Is that enough time to show what she can or cannot do with it? And who would be the best person to judge her success, or failure, in that position?"

Weiss scowls at you.

"The way I see it you have three options. You can continue to sulk, which doesn't help that precious 'image' of yours, and does drag you and your team down. You can put together a reasoned request for Ozpin to make leadership change for your team. Bear in mind that we are not just discussing a change to your position, but also Ruby Rose's. I rather doubt you'll be able to justify it given that this time yesterday you were killing a giant nevermore with a plan _she_ devised. He will almost certainly decide there has been insufficient time to make a reasonable evaluation, but even if he went ahead and made that change he'd almost have to use your…concerns to justify it."

"And irrevocably damage my relationship with my so-called 'partner' and the rest of my team." Weiss' voice still has high-Atlas-winter-levels of chill and iciness, but at least she is starting to think again.

"There is that," you agree.

"And third?"

"You take a long and hard look at why you are here," you reply bluntly. "Leave the Heiress in the boardroom and decide 'who is Weiss Schnee? What is important to her?' Get to know what real people are like."

"Huntsmen and Huntresses are normal?" she asks, her tone has a flicker of her rare, dust-dry humor.

"Pretty far from it, actually," you agree. "But their 'normal' is what you aspire to. Or at least it should be given your presence here. Either way, it's different than those you are used to being around. And if it's _not_ the normal you aspire to…why are you even here?"

Weiss frowned.

"Let me offer you some advice: Take advantage of every opportunity. Never stop trying to improve yourself. Growing up, becoming a huntress, isn't just about fancy attacks, or killing Grimm, or saving people. It's a journey of self-discovery to become the best person you can be."

For a moment Weiss actually looks pensive, then she shakes her head. "Very pretty, but it doesn't help me explain this to the man who controls the majority of the world's production, refining, and distribution of Dust."

"When two advocates stand before an adjudicator, they take the same set of facts—or at least similar sets of facts—and string them together. Whichever advocate has constructed the best narrative, or the one most believable, or even the one that plays best to the adjudicator's sensibilities, wins." Your answer is oblique, the kind that Weiss always had problems with. Give her vague but relevant details hidden in complex documents and she'll pull them out and string them together without even pausing for coffee. Ask her to pull details that are presently applicable out of another narrative and she'd ask—

"That's supposed to help?" Weiss' lip curled slightly.

You resist the urge to sigh because when Weiss walks around with her prejudices up it takes a more than firm hit to get through them.

"What is your narrative?" you ask. This had gone on long enough. Time for a blunt approach and actually accomplish something.

"You mean I should make up a story."

"Not at all."

She frowns a little.

"What are the facts?" you ask slowly. "What do they mean? Are Weiss Schnee and Pyrrha Nikos not on the same team because Weiss is incapable of operating at Pyrrha Nikos' level? Is Pyrrha Nikos not on Weiss Schnee's team because she cannot measure up to Weiss? Are they on separate teams because they offer their individual teams different sets of skills?"

"We're on different teams because our partners grabbed different chessmen."

"Is that a detail your father is likely to know? More importantly, is it _relevant_ to your narrative? Your father has facts, and likely not many of them. You can provide detail, nuance, and context. You can frame a narrative and give facts meaning that your father is unable to discern from Atlas. Or you can let him take what few facts he has and construct a narrative that suits his prejudices."

"Why didn't you just say so?" she asked.

"Do you know what your two greatest weakness are as a Huntress-in-training?"

"I tend to uncover my off-side when—"

"Wrong."

"My lunge—?"

"Wrong."

"My endurance?" actual hesitation crept into her voice.

"Could stand to improve. I'm certain your teammate, the one that lumbers around like a dragon, would be happy to help you in the gym. But also, wrong."

Relief, then dismay wash across Weiss' face in tiny little tells that would be missed by anyone who didn't know her well. Only to come crashing down.

"Fine. What's my greatest failing?"

"Two greatest." You don't smirk at her irritation. "You are highly intelligent. You are perceptive, analytical beyond most of your peers, but you also lack depth. You can see things that are relevant, except when presented in a context other than your own. You have a remarkably difficult time understanding others' point-of-view." Professor Port's class had been a continual struggle for her. It was one of the very few classes where Ruby helped her with homework rather than the reverse.

"I do not!"

"Then why could you not draw conclusions from my comparison of your present circumstances with that of two advocates arguing a case? Why, for that matter, did you need Ruby Rose to tell you that a boarbatusk has a vulnerable belly? Professor Port's story clearly illustrated the point as she was able to draw out this detail and warn you despite having spent the class period…doodling."

"Wha…who told you that!?"

"I am a huntress, Ms. Schnee."

You let her mull that one over for a while and pour more hot chocolate.

"And my second failing?" she finally asks.

"You are overly self-reliant. Not a bad thing for a huntress operating solo. But you are not operating solo at Beacon. You are not yet a huntress. And the huntress on a solo mission is far more common in fiction than ever it is in reality.

"This will be a singular challenge for you. The truth of the matter is that it is harder to learn to be truly self-reliant than it is to rely on—to trust—others, but it is harder still for those who are self-reliant to learn to operate as part of a team."

"Hence why you want me to work out with Yang," she said.

"To have to rely on a teammate to ensure you are gaining maximum benefit and avoiding self-injury… Yes, I think that is a good first step.

"Do have fun constructing your narrative. I will be more than happy to proofread it if you so desire."

* * *

The trick to putting Blake at ease is tea and books. Lure her with one, ply her with the other, then take her unawares.

After spending the last year—two?—sleeping in trees, burned-out cities, or whatever patch of ground looked reasonably dry, you didn't have a clue what to do with the not-small office Ozpin gave you. You settled for going into town and hiring a bookstore to put up shelves along the walls and fill them with whatever books were interesting.

Maybe you'll even get a chance to read them. Most of your entertainment the last few years has been whatever you could cram onto your scroll. You can't remember the last time you held a dead tree before arriving in your past.

"…and self-discovery," she finished enthusiastically as she returned a book to its shelf.

"Feel free to borrow it, if you wish."

"Really?" she asks. "Thank you."

"Not a problem," you reply. She was unaware, so now it was time to put her off-balance. "What pronouns do you prefer?"

Blake gives you an odd look.

The student you'd had in before her had been a 'they' named Blaise—leader of Team BLZE, of course—who carried around a firesword and had a more than borderline case of pyrophilia, and it reminded you of Weiss teasing her after Ruby had told about Penny helping look for her after she had blurted out her previous affiliation with the White Fang.

But then, Blake's personality had been more…fluid than most of your close friends, at least partly stemming from her habit of taking off and doing her 'growing up' as far away from her friends as she could get, whenever something emotionally trying came along. Addressing the latter issue would have almost as profound consequences for RWBY and JNPR as anything you can teach them, but you'd be lying to yourself if you thought your chances of pulling it off in the next year were very high.

"Female pronouns work."

They _work_? They aren't a preference or… Okay, so either Blake was making a joke back, or she's a little more confused than you thought.

It's pretty clear that she doesn't recognize you though. But then, you hadn't really expected her to. Bio-chem detectors are a lot more sensitive than faunus'—even _bloodhound_ faunus'—ability to scent. Finding ways to spoof them—or evade them entirely—had been a not-so-minor priority. But you also can't help but feel relief at avoiding what would have been very awkward, to say the least.

"Why?"

You raise an eyebrow, "you seem confused, if not conflicted, about your species."

Her voice drops and her bow twitches back. "I'm not confused about my species."

"Aren't you?" you lift your teacup to gesture towards the top of her head.

She stares at you.

You nod. "The bow is cute and all, but it doesn't fool me."

Her jaw clenches. "Just because I'm hiding that I'm a faunus doesn't mean I think I'm a human."

"You're hiding that you are a faunus by pretending that you're a human. What's that like?"

"What is _what_ like?"

"Being treated like you're a human."

Blake looks away.

"You've surely met others who are better, more capable, of passing than you are. What's it like, now that you're one of them?"

"Do you think I'm _ashamed_ at being a faunus?" she asks, her normal alto even lower than normal.

"I think you're lying to your partner and team," you reply. "Not the most promising start."

She doesn't reply. You hadn't really expected she would.

"Would you have told them that you are a faunus if Weiss Schnee wasn't on your team?"

This time she looks down at the table. "No."

"Do you realize that is the first direct, definitive answer you've given me?" you ask.

Blake blinks at you. "That's not true."

"Isn't it?"

She frowns then. "I answered your question about pronouns."

"You indicated which 'work.' Hardly the most definite of answers." You lean forward. "Why hide part of who you are?"

"You may be willing—"

"Uh-uh," you cut her off. "Direct answer, Blake. Please?"

Blake's jaw tenses. "I want to be seen for who I am." The words come out short, as though she has to bite them off one by one. "Not what I am."

"Interesting," you say, and very carefully do _not_ smirk as her eyes narrow.

"What's interesting?" she asks when you don't say anything further.

"I asked why hide part of who you are, and you replied that you want to be seen for who you are so… How can you be seen for who you are if you are hiding part of that person?"

No reply. Again.

"Okay. _What_ are you?"

"I don't understand what you're asking."

"You said you don't want to be seen for what you are. So, what are you?"

This time she looks away.

"You haven't really thought about these questions, or answers to them," you observe.

"How am I supposed to respond to that?"

"However, you want," you reply. "Prevarication and avoidance seem to be your favorites. But you could ignore it, make something up, or even tell the truth, I suppose."

Your flip response was rewarded with a bit of a glare, but a small one.

"Do you at least have a plan?"

"For what?"

"For when they find out."

"Who says they will?"

"Who says they _won't_ ," you give her an exasperated look. "Do you really believe you can keep this charade up for four _years?_ "

"Probably not." The reply was so soft, and so long in coming, that you almost missed it. She looked up again. "Do you have a suggestion?"

You shrug. "I'd tell them the truth. Save myself the stress and uncertainty." The irony that you aren't taking your own advice is not lost on you.

"I can't do that."

"I don't mean trade life-stories, Blake," you reply.

"No. I…just no."

"Is that why you haven't joined any of the faunus-rights groups on campus?"

"Classes have been in session less than a week."

"Okay. Do you _plan_ on joining any such group?"

Silence.

"Which are worse? The humans, the faunus who react like you're a human…or the ones who know who you are and what you are doing?"

Still no response.

"Who are you hiding it from? Them…or yourself?"

She puts the teacup and saucer down so hard that they clink. Loudly.

"Just what are you implying?"

"Implying? Nothing," you reply. "I'm just observing and asking awkward questions. You wore the bow while with the White Fang."

"You know?"

"Yes." Let's see how you handle that!

She doesn't reply. Again. _Sigh_.

"Even the human members—admittedly fewer and fewer as the White Fang has shifted towards more…extremist tactics—wore masks."

"Sensible, considering what we were up against," she says.

"I didn't say it wasn't. But the faunus members never hid what they were. Not unless it was something like hawk eyes. Except you. You have been pretending that you are a huma—excuse me, hiding that you are a faunus, for several years now. Tell me, does being a not-faunus feel more natural?"

The look of utter shock on Blake's face is so hilarious that you have to busy yourself with pouring more tea to hide your grin.

The door clicks as you are adding lemon.

With a sigh, you look up and toss your pen through the image of Blake sitting in the chair opposite you.

* * *

You've given a lot of thought to Yang.

Jumping into the maw of a nevermore is only a symptom of the fierce protectiveness for those she cares about. She thinks she hides it behind a cheerfully carefree and adventure-seeking persona, and to be fair she is generally successful at doing so. And one of the reasons she is, is because of just how much of that persona is who she truly is, or at least who she wants to be.

But underneath is the girl whose first mother had walked out on her when she was still a baby, whose second mother had died, whose father hadn't handled it well (to put it mildly), and who had nearly gotten her sister (and herself) killed. That girl grew into a woman who would sacrifice her happiness for her family, and will take foolish risks to protect those she cares about. While risk-taking on the behalf of others is part of the job, _foolish_ risk taking (such as climbing into the mouth of a Grimm) is most definitely _not_.

You've got a plan to address this. It started with the blackboards of Beacon and seems to have doubled as a team-building exercise. So far, so good, and you'll repeat as necessary. But that doesn't help here, because unless you can prove to Yang that you're right where her combat technique is concerned, namely by beating her, it is…unlikely that she'll listen to you, and that's a problem. Yang's semblance gives her an edge in the end of a fight, but it is very much an edge that cuts both ways, and left to herself, it's going to get her killed one piece at a time.

Your plan, such as it is, is to break Yang's aura without actually hitting her. If you manage this trick she won't have an aura to tank hits on, and without being able to tank hits she won't be able to charge her semblance to help her fight. The question then becomes, how do you deprive someone of aura without ever laying a hand on them?

It took you most of the week but you found a solution. Although to be fair, most of that time was spent trying (and failing) to come up with an alternative to the solution you came up with on day one. It isn't what most would consider a good solution. Actually, you managed to surprise yourself by finding something you consider repugnant.

You'd thought you were past that stage.

Although, to be fair, you did come up with an alternative. It was worse.

So your plan, such as it is and what there is of it, is to use your aura to lend resiliency and power to a pair of wooden staves, and then deliberately attack Ember Celica.

Almost every tool used by a huntress or huntsman is a conduit for aura. There are, in fact, damn few that _can't_ be a conduit for aura. In most cases that conduit is minor. Weapons, that is a huntress' _true_ weapon as opposed to an ancillary device used to inflict damage, are not merely a conduit for aura, they are an extension of a huntress' very being. In a very real way, attacking Ember Celica is the same as attacking—as opposed to sparring with—Yang.

At the same time, it isn't as though you are gifted with a great many options since Yang's semblance is tied wholly to her body.

The bad side of this is that, while it is unlikely that you'll hurt Yang, the chances are actually pretty good that you could damage Ember Celica. Perhaps beyond even Ruby's ability to repair them. All it would take is misjudging Yang's aura reserve since without aura to protect them, your aura-enhanced weapons…

Yang opens with an all-too-familiar one-two-forward stomp-three's a feint and you step to the side as the real attack—number two—shoots through where you'd just been and you crack one of the wooden sparring staffs across her knuckle plate. She looks at you, and you whirl the staff around in a salute, and then it's on for real.

Which is where Yang's _second_ bad habit comes into play.

Everyone has weaknesses in their combat technique. Even forms that have no glaring vulnerabilities have a weakness in that they almost always lack any strength _but_ that their very mediocrity has left them with no underlying weaknesses. Yang's technique goes well past weakness to the point it is intrinsically flawed.

Quite simply, Yang's technique is designed throw out a great deal of damage, while harnessing her aura to channel her semblance. That is, actually, incredibly _normal_. Both Ruby and Nora do the same thing to take advantage of their respective speed and strength. But in Yang's case it means her go-for-broke offense has also compromised her _de_ fense because she's counting on tanking those hits with her aura in order to charge her semblance. For the same reason, she tends to stand in place and take hits rather than move, which has left her with serious shortcomings against leg-, mobility-, and agility-focused martial artists.

The latter point isn't _exactly_ a weakness Grimm are likely to take advantage of, but if there's anything the last—next?—few years teach you, is that Grimm are almost the least of your problems.

Oh yeah, there's one more thing. Yang's form assumes the people she's fighting don't have a weapon or ability that can cut through her aura. In fairness to her trainers, both are currently rare. Unfortunately, that does not mean that they will stay rare, and even if they do that she will not encounter them.

Wearing down Yang's aura takes time, but happens pretty much as you expected. You did not expect that she wouldn't notice. But she doesn't so you flick aside the staffs and continue, attacking Yang more directly.

Her eyes flare and there's a little more energy in her stance, her movements, as her semblance begins to charge at last. And that rush of energy masks the hurts she's taking now. You aren't using aura or the kinetic energy catcher-fields built into your tacticals. If you were, one hit unshielded by aura would be potentially crippling. But Yang's body is starting to bruise, to build up lactic acid in the muscles and all the other discomforts that aura normally…washes away.

And along the way you get a better appreciation for Yang's technique.

She's better than you at hand-to-hand. More than you'd anticipated. And while you can still get your hits through, it says more about Yang's technique than yours.

You pop a boot into her belly—cheating, with aura and Dust, but keeping tight control of both—and then duck into her as she first doubles over, and then goes over your hip to sprawl out on the floor.

"You're pretty good," you say.

"Thanks," Yang gasps.

"But only pretty good."

You sit down, cross your legs, and wait as Yang recovers and slowly drags herself up to mirror you.

Graphic proof of her short-comings first. But that's only put her mental defenses up. If you try to go at her directly she'll dig in and you'll be stuck with every bit of stubborn tenacity the Branwen genes ever cooked up and you don't have time for that.

"Do you know what a vorpal weapon is?"

"No," she said.

"What about a unspeakable weapon?"

She shook her head.

"Good."

"Wait, I don't know what these weapons are, and that's _good?_ " she asks.

"Vorpal weapons were banned after the Great War," you explain. "If you're caught with one you get a tribunal, and then not terribly comfortable accommodations for life. It doesn't really matter which Kingdom you're in when you get caught either." Which didn't keep them from showing up after shit got bad. "You see, they have the capacity to bypass aura."

"Wait, there's weapons that can _do_ that?" she demanded.

"Mm hmm."

"I never heard of anything like that!"

"Clearly."

"But—"

"And the other one?" You ask.

Yang shakes her head.

"An unspeakable weapon is just that."

"Unspeakable?"

"And unnamed. They were so horrible, that their very name has been erased from history," you reply. "You see, they not only kill the body, but destroy the soul." You let that sink in for a moment, but only a moment. "If you are caught with one, they skip the trial before throwing you in a hole. If you _kill_ with one, the execution is public and they use the same blade."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"The Headmasters of each of the Academies, among with their other duties, are entrusted with the safekeeping of a book. A book with no name. In it is recorded all of the knowledge that human and faunus alike have acquired…and mutually agreed would have been better for the world if it had never been learned."

What little in it you know of originated with Salem, and you know there's a lot of stuff she created that's in it that you don't know of. There's probably stuff humanity and faunus have discovered for themselves, but you don't know what that is either. You hope never to find out. Your nightmares are bad enough already.

Fortunately for everyone, the Headmasters are responsible for protecting those books much like they're responsible for safeguarding the relics. There is a lot more protection involved than any one person. Which means that Lionheart can't just hand the book over to Salem…assuming she's even interested in it.

"Cakkabás blades are in that book. Vorpal weapons…are not. Yet both still exist in the world. Cakkabás blades still crop up in ruins of ancient cities occasionally, and it's the responsibility of huntresses and huntsmen to secure them when they do. Vorpal weapons are potentially much more common. They were produced in mass during the Great War, and after the war ended it is likely that many were…privately disposed of by their users rather than returned to armories for destruction."

"Right," she said, springing up. "Thanks for the warning, I've gotta—"

"Sit!"

She stares at you and you stare back until she slowly sinks back to the mat.

"A six-year-old with an inactive aura could gut you like a fish if she got her grubby little hand around a vorpal-edged knife."

"I kind of got that."

"Did you also pick up that some people have developed the skill to focus their auras into an edged weapon to achieve the same effect?" you ask. "How about a semblance that accomplishes the same?"

Yang clenches her jaw and shakes her head.

"You're good, possibly even better than most think you are," you continued. "But you're predictable. Your fighting style maximizes the effectiveness of your semblance. In most that would be a good thing, but in your case, it lets your enemies know when you are hurting."

"Grimm don't think."

"Grow up!" You take a breath, seeking clarity of focus once more, unsettled by how easily Yang Xiao Long had gotten under your skin. "Your sister may think being a huntress is all about slaying Grimm and saving kittens stuck in trees. But you, you should know better. Look at who your and her partners are."

"What does Blake and Weiss have to do with this?" Yang asked.

 _Oops?_ I whisper into your ears, trying not to giggle.

 _Shit!_

"For that matter, look at how your sister got here. It certainly wasn't by killing Grimm," you continue. "And the Grimm you've fought thus far might be mindless in their desire for your destruction, but not every Grimm is. Or rather, not every Grimm remains so. They remember. Those that survive, learn. They're functionally immortal, which means those that acquire even a small degree of patience have a _lot_ of time in which to learn how to kill us. Odds are, some have seen semblances that are functionally identical to yours.

"And regardless of what ability to think and plan Grimm do, or do not, possess, it would be more likely that a troop of beringels would walk down the main street of Vale and leave it unmolested than Ozpin would allow me to teach active aura manipulation if he didn't think that there was a far graver threat to his students, and the world, than…Grimm."

"What?" she asks.

You sigh. "He wouldn't allow it to be taught if he thought Grimm were the biggest problem you are likely to face."

"Why?"

"It's dangerous to learn, both for yourself and those around you." It's more complicated than that, but you have her listening at last and you aren't going to risk disrupting that.

"No. I mean…why does he think there's a bigger threat out there? What _kind_ of threat?"

"Good question," you reply. "I don't have specifics I can share with you." Because sharing specifics would open up all sorts of awkward questions you really don't want to try to answer. "On the other hand, you could turn on the news and find all sorts of spark points from Dust stolen across the length and breadth of Sanus, to the radicalization of White Fang.

"And that brings us back to you," you say.

"Right. I'm supposed to just forget about my semblance."

"Hardly," you scoff. "It's a great asset to have… _if you need it_. My point, Yang, is that you _don't_ always 'need it.'"

"It lets me give my opponents a pounding they can't match," Yang said.

"You and Pyrrha both," you sigh.

"Uh…what?" she asked.

"The real world is not a practice bout or a tournament fight," you reply. "And you both persist in thinking that it is."

"No, I don't."

"Battles are not one-and-done affairs, Yang. Sometimes they're slogging, grinding affairs, and your enemies will not give you a chance to rest or for your aura to recover.

"Fighting as though you need your semblance to win is a disservice to your own skill. It compromises your effectiveness in long-duration battles. It not only weakens you, it's predictable, and it leaves you open to anyone or anything that doesn't care about aura.

"Don't get me wrong, it's a great asset to have when you are in dire straits and need that little bit more. But not every battle has to be a near run thing, and against the truly skilled, half of its effectiveness will be as a surprise."

"And it's not a surprise if everyone knows it's coming."

"No," you agree, and can't help feeling a little surprised at Yang's admission.

She's examining the backs of Ember Celica, then, after collapsing them back down to thick bracelets, the palms of her hands. "The thing is, it's me. It's who I am."

"Semblances are, mostly, unique to the individual," you reply.

"So what does it mean that mine lets me hit harder after I've been beaten down?"

"What does it mean that Nora gets supercharged after getting hit by lightning, or that your sister is…really fast?" you reply. "It just is. But if it has to mean something, the only person it really matters what it means to, is yourself. Blessing, curse, motivation, anchor, it's all on you."

Yang's scroll beeped.

"I, uh, have to get ready for my next class," she said.

"Go on. Hit the showers."

"Yeah… Gotta say, Teach. I didn't expect to spend most of the time talking."

"If you don't know the moves by now, we have bigger trouble," you reply. "This, we're just exploring how you might use what you know a little more effectively."

"Gotcha."

"Oh, and Yang?" you call as she starts to head towards the locker room.

"Yeah?"

"I'll be checking with Goodwitch. Continue to overly rely upon your semblance and we will be having this discussion again."


	6. Volume 1, Chapter 4: of bunkbeds

**Disclaimer** : You don't own RWBY, neither do I.

* * *

Weiss had the most immediate need for help. Jaune… Jaune is more of a long-term project. One the sooner you can get started on the better.

He was never the best fighter you knew. A good tactician and leader, yes, but wasted on frontline work.

Which hadn't stopped him from being repeatedly put there by the situations he found himself in.

But behind that, his real strengths are his yet-unknown-to-him semblance, and a set of secondary skills that are almost obscene in number. No matter what needed to be done, or was only mildly useful, if someone else couldn't do it, it was almost certain Jaune could.

Also, he has a kind of dogged determination no matter how bad things are. He wasn't cheerful the way Nora was, and it isn't the same as Ruby's perpetual optimism, but it functions similarly. Quite simply, his is the kind of personality that drags people (mostly ones you care about) through low points and keeps them going well past the point they would otherwise quit.

You hope to avoid those low points, but that's probably unrealistic. Will losing him mean that those low points—or others that you might inadvertently make—break something? It just might. But others paid for his inexperience the first time around and you aren't willing to let them pay a second time.

He's accepted what his presence means for himself. Time to see if he's accepted what it means for those around him. Which is why you are meeting in one of the combat training classrooms instead of your office.

"You, ah, wanted to see me?" he asks as he steps onto the dueling platform.

"You brought your weapons?"

"Um…yeah?"

"Good." You draw Last Dance. A flick of aura sends it telescoping out into a quarterstaff.

He manages, barely, to get his shield into position, but then is flat on his back as you reverse the attack and the other end cuts his knees out from under him. You'll give him credit for not staying there. Or you would if this was for-credit. Instead Crocea Mors skates harmlessly down the length of your staff, and then you slam a boot into his shield and drive him back again.

"Why are you here?"

"Because you asked?" he asks uncertainly.

"Beacon. Why are you here?"

"To be a huntsma— _ah!_ "

He dodges frantically and you let him go rather than press your advantage.

"I will ask one last time. Why are _you_ , why is Jaune Arc, _here_?"

"I don't know what—"

You slam the butt of your staff through his meagre defenses and land a hit directly on his breastplate. Even with aura he'll have a bruise for the next few days. He stumbles back, and you trigger a plasma burst. He gets his shield up, but he's hunkering behind it as you pump out a second burst, and then a third…

"You faked your way in."

"I don't know what you're talking about!" he says quickly. Too quickly, his voice is high-pitched with stress.

His shield has masked your approach and now you brush it aside and grab the top edge of his armor plate. You put a knee into his unprotected belly, then trip him over your leg so he sprawls out on the floor.

"Don't pitch me some sob-story about getting your hands on some transcripts and signing your name to them. You faked it well enough that your application blew past the filters. You did a good enough job to get by screening, to get by _Goodwitch_.

"You would have _died_ during initiation if Pyrrha hadn't saved you. Your partner is relying on you keeping her alive. Your _team_ is relying on you to keep them alive. And you are manifestly unprepared to keep yourself alive."

You crouch down by his head, sitting on your heels, your legs spread. Your lance is planted in the ground, held vertically with one hand while you rest the other on a knee.

"You don't have the training. You don't have the skills. You don't have the experience…"

"I can learn!"

"Can you?" you scoff. "This isn't a combat school. The students here are expected to know how to fight before they ever get through the front doors. We're putting finishing touches on technique. We're strengthening and conditioning aura to the point where our students don't get killed on their first mission. What we are teaching is how to manage risk. How to reduce _risk_. Because the more risks you remove _before_ battle, the more likely you are to survive it. A huntsman has to survive for _years_ before the time, the effort, and the money that society has invested in his training and equipment is recouped, and _still_ too many die on their first mission. Or before their first mission. Your team doesn't need an _amateur_ to help them into their graves, they're getting ready to leap in on their own.

"You are a danger to yourself. As much a danger as any Grimm is. You are a danger to your team, and to every other student at this school. You are gambling with your life, with JNPR's lives, and since they seem to have taken a shine to you, RWBY's lives as well.

"Is _any_ of this getting through to you? You, Jaune Arc, are an active _threat_ to the team you are supposed to be leading."

"Yes, geez. Fine. You know. So why am I still here?"

"This isn't a for credit course so I can't simply fail you, can I?" you ask as you stand up.

Jaune pushes himself up so he's sitting on the floor. "If you really thought all that, you'd go to Ozpin and get me kicked out."

"What makes you think Ozpin doesn't know?" you reply.

"I…he…but…" Jaune stares at you for a while. "Why? I didn't earn this. I faked my way in."

"Didn't you?" you ask. "What are the four ways to qualify for the entrance examination into Beacon Academy?"

"I don't—" he falls silent at your glare. "Four? I thought there were three."

"Four," you say. Ironically RWBY manages to have one of each which is probably a first.

"You graduate from a combat school with high enough standings," Jaune said.

"That's one." The most common, and the path Yang went through.

"You pass placement examinations."

"Two." Weiss' method of entry, though granted she went through what was essentially a private combat school specifically tailored to her. You aren't going to comment on the fact that she took a placement examination in order to take a placement examination.

"Documented field experience, including testimonials and letters of recommendation from licensed huntsmen and huntresses."

"Three." The route Blake took is actually fairly common for those raised outside the Kingdoms. That it's decidedly uncommon at Beacon (and the other Kingdoms), goes to show just how rare out-Kingdom students are.

"And… I don't know."

"You have to do something to get noticed. You have to impress the Headmaster enough that he offers you a spot. Ruby Rose foiled a Dust robbery two _years_ before she was due to graduate Signal Academy. And you… You Jaune Arc managed to slip past every protection in place meant to prevent someone from 'faking their way in.' You did, what you—what nobody—were supposed to be able to do.

"You 'earned' a spot at Beacon when you impressed Professor Ozpin by figuring out how to be accepted despite your manifest unfitness, and because you took the time and put in the effort to do so," I said. "The way he figures it, you must have thought about what it was likely to mean for your chances of survival, so he's giving you a chance to succeed…and be an object lesson to your classmates."

"Oh."

"Of course, just because you earned your way in doesn't mean you have the necessary skillset to survive, much less succeed, here," you note dryly.

"Ow," he mutters, rubbing his chest as he stands.

"Why'd you do it?" You ask. You never did get a clear answer. You had been under the impression he'd come up a few points shy at one of the combat schools and…altered his records somehow. "It couldn't have been easy. It certainly wasn't a matter of grabbing someone else's transcripts and slapping your name on them."

"Huntsmen is what Arcs are," Jaune said. "Generals, soldiers, warriors… We have a gift for it."

"Uh huh."

"I've been studying," he says defensively. "The library has a record of semblances."

It isn't quite true that outside of certain families no two semblances are identical. There is certainly a great deal of variation, but if you record enough of them over a long enough period of time, semblances that are identical in function (if not necessarily appearance or application) emerge. Being able to see how other people have used a semblance similar to your own is a useful training tool.

What is surprising is that Jaune has already availed himself to it. The last time around, he didn't really put any effort into strengthening his aura, or studying his semblance, until just before Haven went up in smoke.

"As it turns out, our semblance," Jaune continues, "It turns out it isn't like most. It's a field-effect, always active."

"I'm familiar with them," you reply.

"It's inheritable. Similar semblances passed from parent to kid is pretty common. But it's usually variations on a theme, either a different way of achieving a similar effect, or a similar theme coming out in different ways. But the Arc's is always the same. Every Time. It makes our units…better. It's like a natural morale boost to those on our side, only more. When we lead, when we're out front being an example, those we lead just do better. That's the only way I can describe it."

Jaune's description had the virtue of being true…and also completely untrue. It was true enough as far as the _minor_ family semblance went. But the Arcs actually had _two_ semblances—albeit closely related—not one. And Jaune had the _major_ family semblance. On their surface, they both did exactly what Jaune said: provide a one-shot buff to anyone in a tactical unit he (or she) was leading. The major semblance…

"I hear a 'but' in there," you say when you can't think of anything else to say.

"But it also gets a lot of us killed," Jaune admits. "Usually pretty young. And now that I know about it, stuff my father has said suddenly makes sense. You see, I think it can only be passed on by fathers. I have seven sisters…and no brothers. Or uncles."

You give him a long look and blink slowly because _this_ was the last thing you ever expected to hear. Oh, the bit about what his semblance did was nothing new, but… "Let me see if I have this straight. You fake your way into Beacon, knowing there was a very good chance that you would be killed before you ever graduated, because you thought you were never good enough on your own. And you think the reason for that is, at least in part, because your father insured you never got the training or experience the others in your year have because he wanted to keep you close to home as _breeding stock_?"

"Um…yeah, pretty much."

Which proves that, among other things, you will _never_ understand how male minds work.

Or maybe it's _human_ minds? No, scratch that, you can think of faunus who have done things just as purely idiotic.

Wait…

"Can _daughters_ inherit it?"

"Yeah, but they can't pass it on to their kids."

Which explains so much, really. "And you really didn't know about any of this…"

"Er…not really? I mean, some of it, yeah, but not about aura… I thought I just wasn't strong enough to manifest one."

"Your father did a real number on you, kid," you sigh. "If he's so hot to have more boys why doesn't he do the job himself…or have women figured out the kind of guy he is?"

"He can't," Jaune said. "Have any more kids, I mean. So…it's pretty much just me."

"Kid, Jaune, your semblance may be the most kick-ass thing in the world, but that kind of thinking is just fucked up." You scratch the back of your head for a moment before shrugging. "Your semblance isn't going to be active less than a week after having your aura activated. It just isn't. You have a choice to make."

"Between you throwing me out or my leaving on my own?" he asked, a defiant note creeping into his voice.

"No." Dear Oum is this fucked up. You want, you _need_ Jaune Arc again. But you also hadn't realized just how woefully out of his depth he was at the start. As much as you need it, you also need to push your (former?) friends. And that pacing makes him both danger and liability. But if you _don't_ get him… "You have to decide which is more important to you. The safety, well-being, and effectiveness of your team and friends…or your personal desire to be a huntsman."

He looks away from you, but he doesn't look _down_. Jaune doesn't have an ounce of quit in him. But, despite whatever doubts he may have (and you're certain he has a lot of them), and despite the newness of his position, his responsibilities as a team leader are something he takes seriously even if he doesn't feel up to them. And you've just asked him to choose between those two parts of who he is.

He struggled to keep pace through that first year and even for months after Beacon fell and you aren't sure at all that the stress you are going to throw at him won't break him. He's certainly refusing to let _this_ break him though he's got to be conflicted as all hell…and that's at least as dangerous for JNPR as he himself is.

Well… No. Your previous analysis of how fucked up this is are actually pretty accurate.

"Those aren't necessarily mutually exclusive," you continue, throwing him a bone. "And I'll be honest. I think you have the mentality for the job." Epic disregard for your own life? Yep, has that in spades.

"But I lack the skills for it," he said, turning to look at you again.

"At this point, yes."

He doesn't say anything in response, but he doesn't look away either.

"Okay. I'll make you a deal," you say. "The Vytal Festival is in Vale this fall. If we can bring you up to a level _I_ am satisfied with before then, I won't do my personal best to have you thrown out."

"That's great!"

"I'm not finished," you say. Watching the hope fade from his eyes is like watching a late blizzard murder the first flowers of spring. "You will maintain a competitive class standing. Whenever you are not in class or studying, you will be training. With your team, with Pyrrha, with me, I do not care. You will run until you drop and then you will pick yourself and run further. Understood?"

"Yes," he said, not nearly as enthusiastically, but more assuredly.

"Good. Right now, you stand where many of your classmates have spent years, if not their entire lives thus far, trying to get to. You said you didn't earn this. Well Professor Ozpin disagrees. But since you feel that way, you now have less than a year to earn it for real. And if I ever, even for a moment, think that you are an active threat to your team, or any other student, rather than merely a hindrance that will likely get them killed, I will kick you so hard you will bounce all the way to the airpads."

"Fair enough."

You can't really think of anything else to say, but…

"Get out your scroll for your Team-Leader in-briefing."

* * *

You'd forgotten how pretty Pyrrha's eyes were.

She blinks and you hold up a hand.

"How many fingers am I holding up?"

"Four?"

"Is that a question or a statement?"

"Four," she said firmly.

"Good." You stand up. You hadn't meant to hit her as hard as you had, but even knowing how her semblance works, and all the years of doing for real what she's only ever done in tournaments, she'd managed to surprise you.

Actually, that may have been it. She managed to surprise you because you had been doing it 'for real' and she hadn't. For Real isn't concerned with pesky little things like rules, fairness, or making sure your opponent comes through mostly unharmed.

Definitely something to keep in mind in the future. As it was, that last hit hadn't been a desperation attack, but it had been rushed.

A little.

And you'd been holding way back. Her near-concussion will teach you to take liberties with Pyrrha Nikos.

"You're pretty good," you say.

"Thank you," she says dryly.

"But only pretty good."

"That's not what most tell me."

"I imagine most are either training you for, or watching you fight in, tournaments."

"Yes," she looks at you warily.

"I'm not. Outside the Kingdoms the only rule is survival. And you will do whatever it takes for you and your team to do so. We don't have any fancy rules about what weapons are allowed, or what techniques or attacks are barred, and combat doesn't end just because your aura dips into the red.

"It ends, if it ends, when either you or your enemy is dead."

"I can—"

"Easy enough when it's Grimm, though the creatures of Grimm you have fought thus far are playthings for children compared to what awaits you out there. But what about when it's humans or faunus?"

"What do you mean?"

"You've been conditioned," you reply. "There are certain moves you don't do. Attacks you don't execute. Techniques you don't use. And you pull blows when your opponent's aura begins dropping. Why?" she starts to reply but you cut her off. "Because if you did any of those things you would do your opponent a serious injury. Maybe you'd cripple them. Might be you'd actually kill them."

"Yes."

"Tournaments aren't real, Pyrrha." She frowns. "They're people play-acting at battle. But they're no more a battle than fencers are sword-fighting. Or paintballers are using real guns.

"Out there, your enemies aren't going to adhere to rules. There _are_ no rules to be adhered to. Trying will only get people killed. If you're lucky, you're the person paying the price."

That makes her look away.

"Okay, let's look at another problem. In one-on-one match-ups you are without peer among your classmates. But as a first-year student you don't operate by yourself. And you feel your teammates are slowing you down."

"I never said that!" Pyrrha said turning back to you.

"And I wouldn't expect you to. But is it fair to say that they don't operate at your level?"

Pyrrha hesitates, looking away before giving a single jerky nod.

"Is it also fair to say that the majority of your experience is one-v-one?"

Another nod.

"With rules."

"Yes," she admitted. "So how do I fix this?"

"Is it something that needs fixing?"

She looks at you and frowns. "Isn't that why we're talking? Because the way I fight isn't appropriate for my team or for the environment?"

"And you want to what…replace your entire fighting style with one more conducive to teamwork and non-tournament fighting?"

"If you think it would be better."

And that's…Pyrrha. Polite, dedicated, desperately lonely, and occasionally almost pathetically eager to please…although it'd taken you a while to recognize it for what it had been. Actually, you hadn't really understood her until she'd been dead for a while.

"What I think doesn't really matter."

"But you said—"

"Pyrrha. What is my function?"

Frown. "I-I don't understand."

"What is my job. Why am I here, in this room, with you? Or let me put it another way. What is the function of the faculty as a whole?"

"To make us huntresses and huntsmen."

"And do you know how we do that?"

"By teaching us."

You smile at that. "It does go with the job title, doesn't it?" You shake your head then. " _What_ do we teach?"

She starts to reply, but you hold up a finger.

"We provide you with skills—knowledge, physical abilities, whatever—that you didn't have before or refine those you did. And we teach you application of those skills. Everything falls into one of those two categories.

"Let us examine today's lesson. You have a problem, and your team has a problem. These problems can be summarized as your fighting style does not mesh particularly well with your team, and your team does not mesh particularly well with you."

"But that's not true at all!"

You raise an eyebrow.

"We get along quite well and—"

"It's not a problem of personalities," you agree. "It's about battlefield integration." The breakdown during the Vytal tournament would be funny under other circumstances such as those that existed at the time. Now, with the increased stress…not so much. And that failing could only partially be laid at Jaune's feet. "Your current problem is making all of the pieces in your team function in a manner that is mutually supportive. You have it easier than most."

"I do?"

"Normally in a situation like this we are looking at weapon selection imposing radically different fighting styles," you explain. "What you, JNPR, has is a matter of unequal experience loading.

"Now. I could solve this problem for you, but I'm not going to."

"But—"

"Because you are going to solve it. You and Team JNPR. All my solving it will do is deprive you of a chance to problem solve, because the next time it happens—and it most assuredly will—I may not be around to solve it for you."

"Oh."

You sit down and cross your legs, giving her time to work through the problem on her own for a little while. After a while Pyrrha sits down as well.

"Do you have any advice?"

You nod because _now_ she's starting to, maybe, get it. "Before you set out to reinvent the wheel, I suggest you have a long talk with your team. Get to know them. Let them get to know you. Your experience makes you an incredible asset. It is up to your team, all four of you, to leverage that asset for the good the team."

"I thought my tournament fighting was a detriment."

"Out there it is," you reply simply. "And it isn't."

"Doesn't it have to be one or the other?"

"Not really." You give her a chance, but the slight creasing across her brow says she hasn't gotten it. "In a tournament bout are you doing your level best to chop a person's arm off?"

"Of course not!"

"And that's the difference. It isn't the moves or techniques that are different—okay, there are a handful that are, but mostly they're the same—it's the execution." You chose the noun deliberately, and to give her credit she didn't flinch. "You have the physical skills already. The difference is all up here," you reach across and poke her between the eyes. "It's the mentality you bring to the fight.

"Do you have what it takes to end a life?"

Pyrrha looks at you with those big green eyes of hers. Part of you hates yourself for doing this, because in a way Pyrrha and Ruby are so incredibly similar. Ruby is so…innocent isn't the right word, but it's the best you got. But Pyrrha? It's taken you two days to realize what you never saw when she was alive. Ruby is a good huntress, she believes in it, in the ideals, and believes with a completeness and dedication that even most of those few who truly dedicate themselves to something will never achieve. But _Pyrrha_ is a good _person_. A good soul. She doesn't deserve for you to do this to her, but she and the rest of RWBY and JNPR don't deserve for you _not_ to.

"Plenty of huntresses never take a contract that puts them against a human or faunus."

You nod. "They do, true enough." Pause. "And if time and circumstance make that choice for you, can you be prepared to see it through to the end?"

She doesn't reply, so you fish out your scroll and open it to the Tec'sus Red contract and pass it across.

She glances at it and starts to hand it back.

"Look at it! He killed twenty people," you say not lifting a hand to take it back. "The youngest was four. At least three huntsmen or huntress who passed through the town he was in declined the contract. If the first one hadn't, Tec'sus Red's body count could have ended at three and that little girl would still be alive. Maybe. Maybe if he'd been stopped early he could have been taken alive. Maybe, but maybe not. Number seventeen was a huntress. The first one who accepted a contract, and who tried far too hard to take him alive."

"What happened?" she asks as you finally take the scroll back.

"I put three high-velocity darts into his heart; basically, turned it into so much pulp." You let her digest that for a little while before continuing. "Even if you only hunt creatures of Grimm, sooner or later you'll run into something that you can't handle. And when you do, you have a choice. You can watch civilians get eaten, or you can die trying to stop it. The only difference between the two is that if you get eaten you don't have to watch the civilians get eaten as well."

"Why are you telling me this?" Pyrrha asked.

"Because out there it isn't about good sportsmanship, or selling breakfast cereal. Even if your mission is to support police officers and you have to go in non-lethal, you have to commit yourself to defeating the opposition quickly and efficiently. Fairness, good sportsmanship, a fighting chance are great in a tournament. In real life all of these mean you have willfully exposed yourself and your team to unnecessary danger. Most cops don't have activated auras. What you or I can brush off can be fatal for them.

"So…you have a decision to make."

"Yes, Ma'am," Pyrrha said.

You ignore the 'ma'am' thing for now. It just sounds…weird coming from Pyrrha, but you've got her actually thinking about something and you aren't going to let her stop. "So, that addresses you. Your Team, as I said, you can be a great resource. you have a lot of experience that would be helpful, to Jaune especially."

"Yes, Ma'am," Pyrrha agreed.

"Your style, you need to work at integrating it to the team, not learning something new. You can't do what Nora does. Ren can't do what you can. It'd be foolish for any of you to try. But your prior experience does not lend itself to 'team' and you need to work on that."

Pyrrha nodded, but at least she didn't call you 'Ma'am' again.

"Now, let's discuss your other problem."

"My other problem?"

"Your semblance," you reply. "You are very subtle, which is unusual in someone your age. Most tend to go full-out, and yours would make that far easier than most. The _problem_ is that using it to fine-tune your own weapon placement makes you lazy. And relying on it to help you throw your enemies off-balance will very likely get you killed."

"But—"

"Every time you use your semblance it requires concentration and energy that you could put to other ends," you cut her off. "Your skills are already very good. _Perfect_ is the enemy of good enough. Fighting Grimm isn't a spectator sport. You aren't being graded on technique. Good enough gets the job done. It needs to be a skilled, efficient 'good enough,' but not more. Perfect is extra energy expended beyond what is good enough. So why waste the effort of being 'perfect' if you can be good enough to do the job?"

"I never thought of it that way," Pyrrha said. "I'm not sure I'd call it lazy."

"Choose a word you like better, then. It's lazy in that you are using your semblance rather than perfecting what should be purely physical."

"I thought you said good enough was—"

"Good enough is a piss-poor rational to skimp on training."

Pyrrha nods slowly. "Perfection is an ideal to be strived for, but impossible to attain. There is such a thing as over-practice."

"Good. I was hoping you already knew that." She doesn't need to know that you know that she knew (or at least, you were pretty sure she knew) that. If she did it would undoubtedly raise…awkward questions. "So why are you using your semblance to try?"

"I…it's just what I have always done," Pyrrha admitted slowly.

"Well, stop. In regards to using it defensively—which I notice you do a fair amount of—tell me: do the Grimm have metal in their claws?"

"…No," she admits.

"And my staff?" You gesture to the wooden quarterstaff you'd used. Despite your normal preference, when it came to fighting Pyrrha you made it a point not to carry any metal on your body. Heh heh.

"No," she says again.

"For weapons…help train Mr. Arc…without using your semblance. We learn more from teaching than we do practicing on our own. And I encourage you to spend less time worrying about being perfect in class." And that's really enough for now. Best to get her started on those instead of overloading her. "Alright, get going, and send in my next contestant."

At least there's less than five hundred of these to do. You're under no illusions that most of the students you're chatting with will seek you out in the future. Maybe a couple will and you'll do what you can for them. But the sooner you get these out of the way, the sooner your real work can begin.

* * *

Weiss hadn't lied about wanting bunkbeds growing up, not really. But she hadn't exactly been forthcoming either. She hadn't wanted a set simply for the sake of having bunkbeds. Her room had been—still was—an oppressively large and empty space, built on the same scale as the rest of the manor. Growing up, she'd desperately wanted someone to share all that space with, and if she couldn't do that for the manor, bunkbeds would have done a great deal to make her room less lonely, less empty, and less oppressive. How ironic was it that the room she now found herself in was smaller than her private bathroom, and had _two_ sets of bunkbeds for the same reason that most families bought them?

Although… Weiss somehow doubted most families resorted to suspending a bed from the ceiling using ropes, or using books as spacers.

Ruby entered with all of her usual energy. At least this time she didn't use her semblance. The petals it generated were fresh and sweet-smelling, but cleaning them was…tedious and there were always several that managed to escape. At least they finally dissipated away rather than wilting and then rotting. And she came with a cart loaded with…milk and cookies.

Of course it was, Weiss did _not_ sigh.

"Team meeting!" Ruby chirped. "Weiss, Blake, I don't know what your favorites are so I grabbed some of everything."

"Of course you did," Weiss said. But she selected two cookies and a glass of milk.

"So first up, team attacks. I have a list of names—"

"You have _names_ for attacks?" Weiss asked. "But we haven't come up with any attacks yet."

"Well, no, I thought we'd come up with the names first."

Weiss stared at her. She was trying to be nice. Really, she was. But who named attacks they haven't created yet?

"Sure, Sis. What'cha got?"

"Well, for me and Weiss—"

"Weiss and I," Weiss offered.

"I've got White Russian. And for Blake and me—"

"Blake and I."

"Black Russian. And for Yang and me—"

Ruby paused, then frowned. "Weiss?"

"Why should I bother?" Weiss asked.

"You and me?" Yang asked.

"Strawberry sunrise."

"Huh?" Blake asked.

"Well, I figure your and Weiss's colors and black and white and then I rush in…"

"That's terrible," Weiss said. It really, really was. And who named their attacks after cocktails?

"I don't know," Yang said. "It's not half bad considering she doesn't have my depth of experience being punny."

"Please stop."

"Strawberry sunrise?" Blake asked.

"Strawberries are her favorite food," Yang said. "And…it's a family thing."

"It's what Dad calls her, his sunny little dragon."

"It could be worse, I suppose. Orange Russian?"

"Now who's being silly?" Yang asked.

"Enabler," Blake said dryly.

Weiss hid her face. Of _course_ , Blake would come up with that given her reading habits. She tried to be secretive about her _Ninjas of Love_ , and only drew attention to the fact that she read smut.

"Huh?" Ruby asked. "How is that the name of an attack?"

"Weiss'll explain later," Yang said. "And—"

"No I won't!" Weiss snapped

"—I'm good with strawberry sunrise, but the Russians are a no-go."

"Fine. Um… Monochrome and checkmate for Weiss and Blake. And…"

The names weren't bad, Weiss decided. Inane, a little foolish perhaps. But they were short, simple, easy to understand and not much potential for misunderstanding them so…

"And I thought up a real attack," Ruby said. "Freezerburn. Weiss lays down a sheet of ice and then Yang heats it up real fast, like, it melts but goes right to a gas from ice."

"Sublimates," Blake offered.

"Right. It should create a low-lying fogbank…briefly…I think."

"It's worth a try, I suppose," Weiss replied, eying the cookie tray. One more couldn't hurt, could it?

"You pick at your food like a bird," Yang said. She dropped off her bed, crossed to the cart, then to Weiss where she dropped four on her plate.

"I do not!" Weiss objected.

Yang crossed her arms and gave her a look, daring her to replace the cookies on the platter but…

"Is there anything else, Ruby?" Weiss asked, pointedly turning away from Yang.

"Yes," Ruby said with a tone that was utterly unlike her normal, happy self. More subdued. Serious even. "Blake, if I'm not available you're in charge of Team RWBY."

"What?" Weiss glared at Ruby for daring to pick someone other than her, then at the other two who had responded at the same time. Yang looked hurt, and Blake…frightened almost.

Weiss heard her teeth grind. Her father's reply to her missive had been terse, mostly formulaic; filled with polite nothings about upholding the Schnee legacy, and sarcastic, back-handed praise about Ruby having a lot to learn from her. Granted, it was better than the real-time diatribe she had expected upon his finding out she wasn't team leader, but to not even be Ruby's Second?

"Sis…"

"Yang," Ruby replied. "If I…" she took a deep breath and then sort of rushed without any real energy in it. "If I'm not available it's probably because I'm…I'm down. I know you. You'll care about me and…and I need whoever is in charge to care about RWBY. You showed that during Initiation, after my cloak got pinned."

Which she totally did, but Weiss certainly hadn't expected Ruby to call her sister out on it. From Yang's expression, she hadn't expected it either.

"And Weiss… If I go down, you might be down too, at the very least you'll be…covering me. And Blake grew up outside the Kingdoms and that's where most of the Grimm are. Yang and I grew up on Patch which is pretty remote, but most of your experience is urban…right?"

Which it was, of course. Maybe, _maybe_ there was something to this Ruby-is-team-leader thing after all.

"Okay," Ruby said in a brighter tone with a clap of her hands. "Next topic. I'm, ah, the fiduciary for Team RWBY."

"You're _what?_ " Weiss blurted.

"Uh…fiduciary? I did say that correctly?" she asked uncertainly.

"Well, yes; but…"

"So, uh…we get paid for missions and stuff," Ruby went on. "Most of the business classes are for second and third years, well, recommended for second and third years, but I got a lot of material on how to organize team finances and I want Weiss to take that on."

"Me?" Weiss asked.

"Well…you _are_ the heiress of the Schnee Dust Company, right?" Ruby asked. "Which means you know all about businesses and stuff."

"Not…quite…" Weiss gave her head a shake. "It doesn't _work_ like that, you dolt."

"Well then how does it work?" she asked.

"It…it…it just doesn't," Weiss huffed. She looked at each of them to find them staring back at her. "Really, you trust me to do that?"

"Really, really," Ruby said.

"Sure," Yang added.

Blake gave her a long look before nodding one time.

"What happened to 'controversial labor forces and questionable business partners?'" Weiss asked. She wasn't trying to be…difficult but Ruby's face told her she was so she took a breath and dialed it back some.

"You're here, not Atlas." And once again Blake insisted on using less than the minimum number of words necessary.

"What does that have to do with anything?" Weiss asked.

"There was a time before…present management took over that the SDC was highly respected."

Weiss tried to ignore the implication the SDC wasn't respected now…entirely because she was trying to be nicer and best teammate to Ruby and not because she agreed with Blake's analysis. "My Grandfather built the company up from nothing by being a Dust miner and a huntsman," Weiss said.

"You're here," Blake repeated. "Not a boardroom in Atlas. We have to entrust our lives to each other if we're going to survive the next four years. It would be churlish not to entrust our fortunes to the one best suited to managing them."

Except Weiss couldn't do hands-on managing. If nothing else their class schedule didn't leave her with the time to do it properly and she didn't care to think about what would happen when they started going on actual mission. But she could find a manager and… she looked around the room, hesitating at the expectant look Yang was giving her…and she could put a lawyer on retainer because sooner or later Yang was going to need to post bail or be retrieved from a drunk tank.

Maybe both?

"Oh," Ruby said suddenly. "Ooooh."

They all looked at her.

"Enabler."

Weiss hid her face in her hands. She most certainly did _not_ facepalm. Yang snickered, and even Blake laughed softly.

"And can I say: ew?" Ruby asked.

"And your attack names were so much better?" Weiss looked up. Blake was sitting on her bed, hugging one leg so her chin rested on her knee as she regarded Ruby. "Iceflower."

"What's wrong with Iceflower?" Ruby asked Blake. "Never mind, Weiss can explain later."

"No, I can't," Weiss said quickly. "I, uh, have an essay…"

"I can ask after that," Ruby agreed. "Has everyone thought about what Blake said about classes? Yang, are you still planning on taking or testing out of those nutrition and personal training courses?"

Apparently, Ruby was going to track their academics as well. Weiss wouldn't need it, of course…at least not with the classwork.

"Good. You're the team's personal trainer."

"I'm _what?_ " Yang cried.

"She's _what?_ " Weiss demanded.

They glared at each other.

"Aura goes a long way," Ruby said. "It makes us faster and stronger. But it can only go so far and we only have so much. Being stronger, more physically fit, means we can use what aura we have for other things. You saw how tired Ren got during Initiation. He, we, got lucky. I don't want to have to rely on luck."

"She's not wrong," Blake said.

"Okay, can do," Yang said slowly. "But you're two years behind us Rubes. Developmentally, I mean. It's pretty easy to overdo it, I almost did, and the consequences of that can be nasty."

"I trust you," Ruby said slowly.

"I'm going to cut all that processed crap out of your diet, not that I've seen much here."

"Not…not my cookies," Ruby said quickly. "I take it back—"

"Nope," Yang smirked as she parroted Ruby. "Ease up, Sis. You can keep the cookies, but no more of those mass-produced things."

"But…" Yang crossed her arms and Ruby slumped in her seat. "Fine…"

"Weiss?" Yang asked.

"Fine, I suppose," Weiss muttered. "I've been meaning to lose five kilos."

"You're what, fifty soaking wet?" Yang asked. "Forget it, from now on you're trying to add five kilos. Ten would be better."

"But—"

"Boardroom, or hunt Grimm?" Blake asked, her tone was even, but the look she gave was anything but.

Weiss glared at her.

"Look, Weiss, I don't think you have five kilos to lose, but even if you did you could put on five and still look better," Yang said.

"Is your math deficient?" Weiss asked.

"Yours is, actually," Yang said.

How _dare_ she! Weiss started to reply, but Blake cut in.

"Incomplete data." And, as usual, tried to convey information in as few words as possible.

"What my partner means is that, first, muscle is denser than fat. For an equivalent mass, muscle takes up less volume."

"Oh," Weiss muttered. That…made sense. Not that she had to tell Yang that. "And second?"

"That muscle will be carried on other parts of your body. Okay, Sis, I can do that. Anyone else have weird dietary restrictions besides Ruby's cookie-fix?"

"No," Weiss said.

"Then why do you pick at your food?" Yang asked. "Seriously, Weiss. I've seen birds with a bigger appetite than yours. This hasn't all been about losing weight, has it?"

"I just, I'm not feeling well," Weiss snapped.

"Acclimation syndrome," Blake said. "First day was your first day outside Atlas, and probably a tiny part of Atlas at that, wasn't it?"

"So what?"

"Vale has a different environment than Atlas," Blake replied. "lower-lying so a higher air-pressure, warmer, different viruses, I bet what's served in the cafeteria is nothing like what you are used to eating… Give your body a week or two to adjust."

"So just Rubes' cookie-addiction?" Yang asked.

"Don't forget your dietary restrictions, Blake," Ruby said.

Weiss glanced curiously at Blake who was now sitting bolt-upright with very wide eyes. "How do—"

"Team Leader," Ruby said. "I don't think they gave me your entire personnel files, but there's a lot in here that I don't really see why I need to know. Not that any of you have stuff to worry about because I enjoy stories and can wait for you to tell them to me… Except Yang, she _swore_ that she kept me apprised of all the interesting stuff, but that's a sisters-thing not a Team-RWBY-thing. But team training and nutrition is a Team RWBY thing so you can tell the Team RWBY trainer about your special diet restrictions, Blake, or I can."

"No," Blake said. "It's okay, not exactly a secret or anything. About 20% of my diet must be protein and I need a steady source of arginine and taurine because I can't synthesize them."

"What happens if you don't get them?"

"The same thing that happens to everything else." Blake sighed as everyone continued to look at her. "Rapid weight loss followed by death in the case of the former. The latter only results in irreversible degeneration of my retinas."

"Lovely," Weiss said. And here she'd been thinking Blake was the _normal_ person on her team.

"Moving along," Ruby said. "Classes! I want us all to take Professor Peach's intro to emergency field medicine. Also, we get the weekends for ourselves unless we're on a mission. I want you all to look over the course offerings for the weekend seminars and see what you find interesting. I think we should do one a month as a team."

"You want us to take classes on _weekends_?" Yang asked.

"Only the fun ones like, you know, heavy weapons familiarization, and how to improvise explosives, how to fly a bullhead might be useful. Oh, and we should probably go camping a few times to get Weiss used to the woods, and having to cook on a fire, and not having access to a shower."

"Seriously?"

"The cities aren't exactly teaming with Grimm," Ruby said.

"And outside the Kingdoms isn't exactly teaming with five-star hotels," Blake added.

"Wonderful," Weiss muttered.

"Don't worry, Weiss," Yang said cheerfully. "I know all about hair-care in the field."

"Moving on, I'm taking all the armory courses," Ruby said. "Well, those I haven't tested out of, and there are a couple I need to pick up applied high-energy physics and some advanced Dust classes for first. So, I'll be team armorer. Yay! And I've signed us up for Professor bar-Adama's advanced aura manipulation class. She only has a few sessions a week and the whole team needs to be there so Weiss, Yang, you'll need to find different sessions of…"


	7. Volume 1, Chapter 5: New Moves

**Disclaimer:** No ownership is claimed, intended, or implied.

* * *

The Gym was something of a misnomer at Beacon. For starters, there wasn't one gym, there were six. And each wasn't just a couple of rooms filled with equipment ringed by squash courts and the like, but a whole warren of rooms, tracks, pools, courts, and other training areas. Many had the traditional machines, free weights, indoor tracks, and various game courts that would have been instantly recognizable anywhere on Remnant. But others would have struck a casual visitor as odd, if not outright bizarre; the kind of specialized equipment meant to train huntsmen and huntresses for any type of combat in any possible conditions.

"Lifting for us isn't like for normal people," Yang said as she led them through one of the rooms filled with weight machines. "Normal exercise causes stress on the muscles and bones, microfractures. When the body heals, those areas are stronger, better able to resist future stress."

"Scar tissue," Blake said.

"Basically, yeah. But there's a difference between 'scar tissue' from a healthy workout, and what is left from healing a Grimm ripping your back open," Yang agreed cheerfully. The rest of her team was taking it in. The constant—and varied—movement, the not-quite-harsh lighting, the cacophony of clanging, banging, and grunting, the smell… If any were having second thoughts it wasn't apparent.

"Aura gives us an edge in both resisting and healing injury. Basically, it's a status reset _status quo ante_. Which means that if you use it, at all, during workouts—or recovery _from_ workouts—you get no benefit. Usually you want to exercise no more often than every forty-eight hours for a full-body workout. Or you can do more, but shorter, workouts by alternating upper and lower-body. Ruby, you're going to need to figure out our combat classes and combat training, and probably that aura course, so they come in at the end, before our next exercise session. Otherwise, what we'll be doing here is just wasting time."

"I can do that," Ruby agreed. "Especially if we do three sessions a week, that'll give us two two-day blocks, and one of three?"

"That works," Yang agreed.

 _Good so far_ , Yang thought to herself. "Okay, safety brief. We're going to be using free weights for strength training. We'll probably use some machines—treadmills, bikes, and the like—for warm-up and cool-down, but not lifting. Okay, machines. In here a 'machine' is any equipment where you aren't directly affecting weights, but indirectly, usually via a cable or lever. Rubes, Weiss, you're just too damn small for most of the weight machines."

"So nice that you remember my name," Weiss snarked.

Yang shook her head. "There's a time for jokes. In here isn't it. Since we can't use aura to train, it also means we don't have aura to protect ourselves from injury and there are a _lot_ of ways to hurt yourself in here.

"For that reason, no lifting without a spotter. A spotter's primary job is to keep you safe. Some of that will be manipulating weights, getting a bar from storage position to where you can begin using it, or freeing you if you have an emergency. But the big one is making sure you're doing the exercise correctly. Doing something wrong doesn't just mean that you may not benefit from it, it means that you could injure yourself. You will all be spotting for each other. But until I'm satisfied that you can spot, I'll be working with you individually, and I've got a couple of friends from other teams who will help as well.

"Continuing on safety. Weiss, Blake, we're all going to have to put up our hair. Ruby, you might want to do the same. Also, no cloak in the gym."

"Okay," Ruby said dejectedly.

"And Blake, the same goes for the bow."

"But—"

"I get it," Yang said, holding up a hand. "It's you. I'm not saying ditch it entirely. I'm just telling you, you can't wear it in the gym."

"Ruby—"

Yang clenched her hand as Blake appealed to Ruby, but her sister shook her head.

"Yang's in charge in the gym," she said.

Yang frowned, not sure if she was happy Ruby had affirmed her position, or pissed that Ruby had put her in the position of having to go against her partner. "Look, you can't wear it. It's just too damn easy for it to be caught in something."

"But—"

"Let's discuss it later," Yang compromised. "I want to finish showing you around first."

* * *

"I wonder what her problem is?" Weiss snarked as she stalked down one of Beacon's many corridors. Her partner was a half-step behind her, pulling a cart.

Ruby shrugged. She knew (probably) what Blake's issue was. But she knew because she had access to Team Leader Files and so it was something she Did Not Discuss with her other teammates. Especially not her Sister. Or Partner. Or Blake (because she was neither partner nor sister and special because of it). "You've never watched a Spruce Willis movie?" she asked.

"No," Weiss said. "Movies are vulgar entertainment for the masses. I've…seen a few art films, and those considered classical, of course."

"Uh-huh," Ruby said, opening the doors to one of the smaller student lounges and hauling in the cart loaded with snacks.

"Where are the chairs?" Weiss asked. "What is _that?_ "

Ruby looked at where her partner was pointing.

"Oooh, it's got bean bag chairs. C'mon, this one looks big enough for both of us!"

"What is—"

"It's squishy," Ruby explained. "See? It shapes to you. Are you telling me you don't know what a bean bag chair is?"

"I've heard of them, of course," Weiss said quickly. But then her shoulders slumped slightly which Ruby was learning it was less Schnee and more Weiss talking. "But I've never seen one before."

Ruby considered how to reply to that for a moment before deciding blunt honesty was called for. "It strikes me that you don't have a lot of normal experiences."

"Normal is mediocrity. Schnees are not mediocre."

"Uh-huh," Ruby said. "Did you have fun?"

"I beg your pardon?"

"Did you have fun?" Ruby repeated. "With your recitals, fancy dinner parties, and balls, and classical art films and…Schnee-stuff. Did you have fun?"

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"If you don't enjoy something, why keep doing it?" Ruby countered.

"I… You wouldn't understand."

"I'm not sure I'd _want_ to understand," Ruby replied. "Have a seat."

Weiss glowered at her, and Ruby ignored it as she moved the snack cart close so they could both reach it.

Weiss still wasn't moving. Time to take a lesson from the Big Sister Playbook.

Ruby shoved Weiss so she landed in the chair.

"Watch it you dolt!" Weiss snapped, pushing herself up. The contents of the chair shifted under her hands though and she fell again, this time onto her back.

"Well?" Ruby asked.

"This is…surprisingly less uncomfortable than I anticipated," Weiss muttered as she shifted around.

"You could just say that you like it," Ruby said as she squeezed in next to Weiss.

"Hey!"

"Shh, movie," Ruby said, selecting an icon on her scroll. The room's lights dimmed and the wall panel flickered as the movie started.

"But—"

"Have some cheesy popcorn," Ruby said, shoving a bag into her partner's hands as she cuddled in next to Weiss.

"This is making my hand orange."

"So?"

" _So!?_ "

"Lick it off," Ruby said.

"That's…that's _barbaric!_ "

"So's disrupting Spruce Willis. Now shush."

"But—"

" _Shush!_ "

* * *

The door beeped, and Ruby paused the film. Weiss quickly tried to wipe the cheese-dust from her fingers as Ruby used her scroll to unlock the door.

Yang breezed in followed by a subdued-looking Blake.

"Hey, is that Spruce Willis?" Yang asked. "Nice taste, Weiss. Didn't know you hadn't in you."

"I didn't… I'm not…" Weiss sighed. "Why do I bother?"

"So…" Ruby drawled.

"Yang has arranged for us to book one of the smaller weight rooms for our use," Blake said. "But we're going to have to get up early in the morning."

"I figure this way Snowflake won't have to worry about the boys staring at her," Yang added.

"Something you're no doubt familiar with," Weiss said. But it lacked her usual bite. Actually, she was rather touched that Yang—

"And Blake?" Ruby asked.

"What about Blake?" Weiss asked.

Blake sighed. "I've been using the bow to hide my ears."

"Your…ears?" Weiss asked blankly. "That makes no sense."

"Is that door—"

"Locked," Ruby said instantly, using her scroll to lock the lounge again. "I'm pretty sure the staff can override it, but that's probably true of anywhere we could go."

"Good enough. I guess."

Weiss watched as Blake reached up and tugged her bow off and— _oh_. "Your ears," she said flatly.

Blake flinched.

"You knew," Weiss continued, looking first at Yang, then at Ruby.

Yang shrugged. "Not 'til just now."

"I don't talk about Team Leader stuff."

"You _knew_ ," Weiss hissed at Ruby.

"I don't talk about Team Leader stuff!" Ruby crossed her arms and her face twisted into what might have been an attempt at a resolute scowl, but instead looked like a pout.

"You…how could you?"

"Why shouldn't she have?" Blake asked.

"And you!" Weiss said. "You've been lying to us all this time?"

"It's been three days," Yang noted.

"Name one time I've lied to you."

"Oh, how about that you were _human_?"

"I never said I was," Blake said lowly. "You assumed."

"You _let_ us assume," Weiss retorted.

"Guys," Yang said.

"No," Weiss said. "I get that she's your partner. But you do not get to brush this off."

"I'm not—"

"She lied to us. Would have gone _on_ lying to us."

"You don't know that."

"I don't have to!"

"Why, because all faunus are liars and thieves?" Blake asked in a low voice.

"I didn't say that."

"Or that we're little more than clever animals?"

"I didn't say that either," Weiss retorted.

"You certainly didn't disagree with the sentiment though," Blake said.

"You—"

 _TWEEEEEEEEE!_

"Gah!" Weiss yelped as Ruby's whistle screeched in her ear.

"That's _enough_ ," Ruby said. "Both of you," she added when Blake started to reply.

"Weiss," she said, turning back to her partner. "There are things we don't talk about. We don't talk about what's in my Team Leader Files unless, you know, grades and stuff. Yang and I don't talk about our Mom. You don't talk about your family. Blake doesn't talk about…uh, her ears, I guess."

"It's been three days," Weiss repeated. "There hasn't been time to talk about any of that stuff."

"Do you want to talk about your family?" Yang asked.

"No!"

"So… Our Mom. Your family. Blake's ears." Ruby repeated.

"What's wrong with your mother?" Weiss asked.

"She's dead," Yang said bluntly and Weiss felt something ache as Ruby flinched.

"We don't talk about it," Ruby repeated. "Not because we _dis_ trust each other, but because we don't trust each other. Because Yang's right. It's only been three days."

"That makes no sense," Weiss said.

"It does, actually," Blake said. "None of us really knows each other."

"Speak for yourself, Pussycat."

All three of them turned to look at Yang.

"What? Too soon?"

"Don't ever call me that again," Blake said flatly.

"What about your _purr_ fect ears?"

Blake's glare intensified.

"Riiight… Don't joke about the ears. Got it."

Blake continued to glare for a moment longer, then turned back to Weiss. "Sisters aside, none of us knows each other. We may not actively distrust each other, but that's really not enough time for us to fully trust each other either."

Weiss frowned, but as much as she wanted to refute what Blake had said, she couldn't.

"So," Blake continued, "if you'll try and think of me as 'Blake' and not a 'liar' or 'dirty faunus,' I'll try to think of you as 'Weiss' and not a 'Schnee.'"

"I never called you a dirty faunus," Weiss said in a soft, silky voice smooth as…ice. "And there is nothing wrong with being a Schnee!"

"Your father's daughter, then."

That made Weiss flinch. After a moment she reached up and touched where her scar bisected her eyebrow. "That…I'll give you."

"Oh-kay?" Yang asked. "Does any of us _not_ have family drama?"

Weiss huffed and crossed her arms. Blake examined the ceiling.

"Nope," Ruby decided. "Are we all good then?"

"Good might be…stretching it," Weiss said. She looked at Blake. "I'll have questions. Most of what I know of…your species does not come from a source I'd consider remotely reliable."

"Oh." For a moment Blake looked almost ill. "Joy."

* * *

Without heels Weiss was even shorter than Ruby.

Actually, it was kind of amazing just how much their combat clothes hid. Without the flowing sleeves of her bolero, and flare of her combat skirt, Weiss wasn't just tiny, she was thin. Yang was just the opposite, with the puff-sleeves of her jacket hiding the true breadth and strength of her shoulders, and the flaring half-skirts distracting from powerfully-built hips and thighs.

"I still think the treadmill is too slow," Ruby said. "I'm sure I could improve one."

"Yeah?" Yang asked.

Ruby nodded. "It'd probably just be a matter of increasing the voltage."

"Uh-huh. And you could run on it?"

"Yep!" Ruby grinned.

"Without using your semblance?"

" _Maaay_ be?"

Yang raised an eyebrow.

Ruby ducked her head. "No."

"And what did I say about aura and semblances?"

"No aura, or semblances, in the gym."

Blake had to stifle a laugh at her leader's crestfallen expression, and even Weiss looked a little less self-conscious.

"Squats. Weiss, you first."

Weiss glanced briefly at Blake and Ruby. Then she bent over to touch the ground, before unlocking her knees and began to…fold herself.

"Yeah, that's not going to work," Yang said. "Give me your hands."

Weiss glared up at Yang, then stood and held out her hands.

"Blake, Ruby, pair up. Do what Weiss and I do. Down."

Yang was…better than Blake had anticipated. Not skill-wise, but in how she handled people. She'd thought her partner was her complete antithesis, and maybe usually she was. But this Yang was calm, supportive, patient… She didn't crack a joke at the mash Weiss had made of a squat, or call her out on poor balance, just smoothly corrected each problem without even calling attention to it.

"Remember to keep your spine straight," Yang said as she dropped until it was as if she were sitting on an invisible chair.

Blake felt her own muscles strain, and Ruby needed more than a little help with her balance, but most of her attention was on Yang.

"C'mon, lower."

"How do you do this?" Weiss hissed.

"Eh…that probably won't be very helpful to you."

"Try me."

"Imagine there's a cute boy watching."

Weiss and Blake both froze.

"You cannot be serious," Weiss said.

"Cute girl?"

"Yang."

"Blake?"

" _Yang_ ," both Weiss and Blake hissed simultaneously. They looked at each other in surprise, and then quickly away.

"Okay, seriously. Your target is to touch your hams—hamstrings—that is, the backs of your thighs, to your calves. Go as low as you feel comfortable and stop. If you need to work up to going that low, it's fine. You don't ever want to try and force your body into something uncomfortable."

"What exactly is this supposed to do?" Weiss asked.

"Back down, and this time hold it when you're in a sitting position." Yang waited until they were all in position. "Okay, you feel that in the tops of your thighs?"

"Yes," Weiss said.

"Those are your quads—quadriceps. Squats target them in particular."

"I mean, how is this practical?" Weiss asked. "This doesn't sound like a short-term project."

"Okay, back up."

Blake watched as Yang stepped away from Weiss.

"Put your hands behind your head and work it on your own. Remember to keep your head and chest up. Ready? Down. Up. Down. Up."

Yang's directions were smooth, but Blake recognized that her partner was used to a much faster pacing. Once they got into rhythm Yang stopped calling for directions. "How is this practical? The quads are the biggest muscle in your legs. A lot of the power for your jumps, and most of the power for your front kicks, comes from the quads. And they are energy and oxygen hogs. One of the things this'll do is make them run more efficient-like.

"But no, Weiss, this isn't a short-term project. It's more of a lifestyle, really. Or at least it will be for the next few years. Most huntresses use aura for strength, endurance, and agility."

"Why?" Ruby asked.

"Two reasons, really," Yang said. "First is, this takes time, energy, commitment. A huntress' lifestyle already keeps them pretty healthy, and while your ability to, uh, improve yourself this way effectively slows down, it continues to scale so long as you use it. There are limits, both absolute and practical, as to how far you can go with this. So, for most, the gains aren't worth the investment needed. Second, the draw on your aura that normally covers what we'll be training up to do is miniscule."

"And yet here we are," Blake said dryly.

"Right. Normally you work up to a level you want, and then workout to maintain that. That's what normal people do. What I'm thinking is, we grow your capacity—strength and endurance—while in school. I actually started that last year. Since aura is tied to your body…"

"We will eventually be able to use aura to 'maintain' what we have developed," Weiss said. "Clever."

"Thanks."

"But why do so in the first place if the aura-draw to accomplish the same thing is, as you said, miniscule?" Blake asked curiously. It seemed very much out of place with her generally free-spirited partner, but she was coming to suspect that there was far more to her partner than what met the eye.

"Let's just say I'm acutely aware of my aura reserve," Yang said.

"Why?" It couldn't be because it was dangerously low. At the very least certain minimums had to be met. Anyone capable of passing that would certainly have enough for basic combat enhancement.

"My semblance in pretty much straight combat buffs," Yang sighed and ran a hand along her tied-back hair. "Strength, speed, reaction times all spike. The thing is, I need to tank hits in order to charge it. When my aura is at its weakest is literally when I'm at my strongest."

Blake nodded. "And that means you don't have aura to spare. Or rather, what aura you have you don't want to _need_ to spare on other things if you don't have to."

"Yeah…"

Blake frowned at her partner's suddenly subdued tone. Movement caught her eye and she turned back to Ruby, only to find her nodding towards Yang. "Is something wrong?" she asked.

"Not really. Only that I think I need to think about being less willing to tank those hits."

"That sounds sensible," Weiss said.

Yang got up and came back with some metal plates, and pushed one into Weiss' chest. "Wrap your arms up so that you hold it by the upper edge."

"As revenge goes, isn't this petty?" Weiss asked as Yang passed off the other plates, and Blake hid a smile as she realized that Yang had given the Heiress the second-heaviest of the plates.

"Nonsense," Yang said cheerfully. "This is good exercise. The weight makes you more conscious of your form."

"Tyrant," Weiss muttered.

"Smile when you say that, Weiss, and I'll see about getting us some kettlebells."

"Are they lighter than this?"

"No. But they are easier to hold."

* * *

"Kill me now."

Blake stifled a grin as Ruby flopped on the table in the cafeteria. Then she stifled a wince as the bow pulled against her ears. She'd forgotten what it felt like having them free. The opportunity had almost made the experience worth it.

"I'm so hungry I could eat a horse," Ruby moaned from under the cowl of her cloak.

"Seconded. And I've had horse…I think," Weiss said.

"You think?" Blake asked.

"It was at a fancy dinner. Everything was made up to look like something alive, but none of it resembled what it had actually came from," Weiss said.

"How was it?" Blake asked curiously.

Weiss blinked at her, "You mean the feast? You could have used the saffron to dye Atlas to something better suited for Vacuo. The chef used enough pepper to burn the stomachs of a third of the population, and enough ginger to settle them back down. If the wind was out of the north-east the cinnamon and cloves would have watered eyes in Mantle. There was this monstrous white peacock that someone forgot to cook. Someone tried to carve it and it decided to carve out the carver's eyes instead."

Ruby's head jerked up. "How does someone forget to cook a peacock?"

A better question, Blake thought silently, was who thought peacock was a normal dietary component.

"Everything had its fur or feathers replaced after it was done cooking, of course."

"That makes sense," Ruby agreed just before her head hit the table again.

"There was a boarbatusk made out of doves. And—"

"I meant the horse," Blake said, trying not to laugh.

"Oh." Pause. "It was disgusting."

And the blunt proclamation told her just how miserable Weiss was feeling.

"Shh," Ruby murmured. "Sleepy nap time."

"Food!" Yang announced.

Blake turned to find her partner holding a tray in each hand, a third balanced across one bicep, and a forth perched on top of her head.

"Let's see… Partner gets smoked salmon with cream cheese and green onions." A tray with an omelet came down and settled before her. "Also pancakes—don't tell Nora I swiped them—with berries. And a side of pineapple.

"Princess—"

"Don't call me that."

"Has this weird thing with spinach and goat cheese with a side of olives. Pancakes with fruit compote—whatever that is—and dusted with powdered sugar, and sliced melon.

"Sister-dearest has ham, onions, bell-peppers and non-goat cheese. Chocolate chip peanut butter pancakes with marshmallow cream and caramel sauce. And a bowl of fresh—" Ruby's head snapped up.

"Strawberries!" both sisters finished.

"And milk!" Ruby added.

"And fruit juice?" Blake asked, examining the second glass.

"Vegetable-fruit juice. If the goat-cheese thing weirds you out don't ask what's in it, this is worse." Yang picked up her own and drained the top third of the glass. "Tastes okay, though."

"No coffee?" Weiss asked pathetically.

Yang produced another tray from somewhere. This one held four mugs with the crest of Beacon and one each in red, white, black, and yellow. "Cream and five sugars for sis. Princess is one fake sugar, and half a half-and-half. Blake is black tea in a black mug, easy to remember."

"And you?"

"Black as night, hot as hell, and sweet as a love-sick Mistralian."

"Good morning, Jaune," Pyrrha said behind them.

"Case in point."

Weiss reached for hers and Yang pulled it away.

"Uh-uh. You have to at least take a bite of omelet first. And drink half of your milk."

For a moment Blake thought Weiss was going to lunge at Yang with her fork, but instead she daintily cut off a piece of omelet, stuck it in her mouth, and chewed. Two more pieces followed before she reached for the mug again.

"This is good," Weiss said.

Yang smiled brightly. "And you have to finish your drinks before you get up."

"There's no way. I'll be swimming all morning," Weiss protested.

"Oh yeah, that reminds me."

Blake watched in half-horrified wonder at what was coming next as Yang set aside her own fork and dished out her scroll. She tapped a few times, and then all of their scrolls dinged.

"Are these…wall samples?" Ruby asked. "I don't think they'll let us paint the dorms."

"Piss chart," Yang said, beginning the assault on her own omelet as Weiss gagged. "If it's darker than that red line you aren't drinking enough."

"You're enjoying this far too much," Weiss seethed.

* * *

Chel Midas was an older man with age-silvered hair, parchment-like skin, and wore bowties with suits that were noticeably out-of-date if not quite outright antiques. He had gotten his start in the Schnee Dust Company, and had taken grandfather's retirement as a cue to resign to start his own company, which had done nothing but endear him to Weiss when she had started looking for someone in Vale who could manage her holdings.

Now he sat listening to her speak.

If anyone at King and Midas had thought it odd that a teenage girl was meeting with a senior partner, or for that matter had recognized her as Weiss Schnee, it hadn't been apparent. Discretion and competency were the cornerstones of King and Midas and they charged accordingly.

"Miss Schnee—"

Weiss glared at him.

"Weiss," Chel sighed. "I took your offer as a courtesy to my memories of your grandfather. Without him I would never have been able to start this company, much less grow it to where it is. I have fond memories of him. And, quite frankly, I wanted an excuse to keep my hand in the game. But my first priority has to be this company, and you are not our only client."

"Of course," she said.

"Yes, well…" he sat a little straighter. "Miss Schnee," he said in a rather more formal tone, "there are two issues I have with your proposal. First, there are things that might benefit your accounts, but would not benefit Team RWBY's, and vice versa. This proposal puts me in a potential conflict of interest. Second, your account is much larger than I had anticipated when I first agreed to be your factor. I no longer have the time or resources to do it justice and still discharge my duties to my firm."

"I see," Weiss said. "And you have a proposal which you believe will address these concerns?" she asked, playing along because that was how the dance went.

"I do. I would like to pass on your personal accounts to another factor. I have several here that I could happily recommend. If you wish, I can make available an empty office so that you can review their personnel files and conduct interviews as schedules permit. Assuming we can find someone you deem suitable, I would be happy to take on Team RWBY's account. At the very least I can get it set up in a manner that we both will find suitable. Long term…well, we shall have to see how successful it, and your team, are."

"That sounds sensible," Weiss agreed. "I have…concerns. Concerns that whoever my factor is will need to be able to address to my satisfaction before any contracts are signed, of course."

"I recall our conversation when you, and your father, first hired me. Would I be correct in assuming that your concerns are mostly the same?"

"Mostly," Weiss allowed. "I would like you to consider the possibility of long-term coordination of my accounts and those of Team RWBY."

Chel raised an eyebrow. "We can do that. Have you discussed the possibility with your team?"

"I have not yet shared my long-term plans with them," Weiss said. And she didn't plan to do so until she absolutely had to, and not just because she wasn't at all certain about what those long-term plans might entail. "I just want to make sure the framework is in place for coordination so that once I have discussed those plans, any cooperation can be implemented on a moment's notice."

"Hmm. Very well."

"With those provisos, I agree in principal with your suggestion. Shall we discuss particulars?"

* * *

Somewhere in Atlas

"Right. You have a good night," Eb Oda glanced at the clock on his terminal's monitor, "morning," he appended, but the caller had already disconnected. He closed the connection and stared blankly at the ticket for a moment, then typed: PEBKAC before closing it out as well.

Was he really only two hours into the shift? Yep.

And the post had sounded so damn good when he'd applied for it too! Watch supervisor for a sub-department in the headquarters of one of the biggest companies in the world. Instead, there were so many things wrong that to keep track of them he had a list that he updated…frequently.

Starting with his office. Center, Technology, Information, Technical Support Services. A mouthful that meant his office was the place people in the company called when their computers stopped working. By company policy his operators were supposed to announce, by acronym, their office (CTITS2) and shift (night) which inevitably resulted in both internal complaints from HR for sexual harassment, and at least two callers each week looking for…mature entertainment.

Since it was night (and currently it was even, briefly, dark out which wouldn't be the case once summer got around), HQ saw no reason to employ (and pay) a full shift of workers. _Despite_ it being morning in Vacuo and late-afternoon/early evening in Mistral and his was the global headquarters' call center. Eb didn't answer calls because he was bored. He answered them because he didn't have a big enough staff, and his efficiency reports _still_ blasted him for caller wait-times.

No, the reason he was bored was that the calls he _did_ get were blithering idiotic. Instead of looking at problems of information security, or ensuring the integrity of the SDC network, or any one of a dozen _interesting_ problems, his problems came down to 'A is not plugged in to B' or Problem Exists Between Keyboard and Chair.

"Boss?"

It boggled the mind that something like the cross-continental transmit system (for example) existed, and yet it seemed that even the people who were responsible for making sure it kept operating were technologically illiterate.

"Boss!"

Eb snapped out of his reverie. He shook off the mental cobwebs as he swept his chair back upright and his feet found the floor.

"Can I get you to take a look at something, Boss?"

"Sure, Blueski," Eb said. He pushed himself out of his chair, happy for a distraction. Actually, it was earlier than he'd expected. Blueski had needed a break from inane callers even more than Eb had, so he had put him on tracking down some kind of traffic slow-down the previous shift had reported in sections of the building. "What've you got?"

"I'm…not sure." Blueski looked up as Eb leaned over his shoulder. "I've got _something_ though…"

"Oh?" Eb frowned. Filling all three of Blueski's monitors was some kind of spreadsheet with paired columns, apparently updating in real-time because the right-hand columns, most of them anyway, kept flicking. But there was no key or reference to explain them. "Okay, Blueski. What am I looking at?"

"I tried to track down that traffic thing," Blueski said. "But the pathways looked clear. I mean, there was no data—or at least no more data than usual at this time of night—flowing on them."

"Makes sense."

"Now, it could be that someone was moving something really big around, or a lot of people were, unusual traffic patterns and what not. But those tend to be…momentary. I mean, they happen, and then they're done. This was apparently pretty consistent and on-going. Then I started thinking, what if it isn't the network? What if the problem is where data goes _into_ the network, or comes out?"

"Which shouldn't be a problem _now_ ," Eb said.

"Right. Most of the building is empty," Blueski said. "But then I came up with this."

"What is… _this_?" Eb asked.

"It's the power usage of every computer workstation in the building. The _current_ power usage." Blueski scrolled for a moment to a highlighted block. "That's us."

As to be expected, all of the computers in the indicated block were drawing power…as were many, most, of the computers _outside_ the block.

"But—" as Eb watched, a value that _had_ been zero began creeping up. "Okay. This can't be right. Most every station should be powered off, or in standby mode."

"Right. Which is why I called maintenance and had them check." Blueski tapped a key and the chart on the left-hand monitor broke into a two-by-four set of the same monitoring program he'd set up. "I've got eight office bays in as many different departments on eight separate floors, all with live computers that should be either sleeping or powered off…and aren't. And what's more—"

Blueski tapped another command and the center screen flashed black, then colored lines began to spread across it. "This takes the data from the tracking program, and maps it. It's abstract, showing relative proximity of problem computers to one another. I don't have access to actual maps of physical loc—"

"This is good work," Eb said absently as he reached over Blueski's shoulder. He zoomed in on a patch of inky blackness in time to see a green thread snake through it. As he watched, that thread shaded slowly to yellow. More green threads branched out as yellow became orange. Green became yellow as new green threads reached out and orange shifted to red. "Very good work," he added, giving Blueski a pat on the shoulder and rather doubting the tech would be getting any other praise. Not soon, anyway.

"Everybody listen up," he said, standing. "I'm putting us on—" procedures didn't cover a situation close to this so it was time to make shit up "—alert," he said. Then bulled ahead before anyone could question him. "Dorado, I want you to separate this center from the network. Keep our own stuff linked, but physically separate our computers from any other electronic network, including wireless.

"Corona, while Dorado does that I want you to go onto the company directory, and remove all electronic ticket generation. Make this center call-in only. Victoria," he looked at the one person on his small staff he _knew_ was a closet troublemaker, "I want you to figure out how to shut down the SDC's networks. All of them. But don't actually do anything without my permission."

"Uh, Boss?"

"Go, Dorado."

"What is going on?"

"Good question," Eb nodded. "Alright, all of you, close down whatever you're working on and listen up. We don't _know_ what is going on. What we do know is that a bunch of computers that _should_ be powered off, aren't. We also know that people were reporting a slow network during the daylight shifts. It's not the network, it's the computers themselves, but we do not know why, and the problem appears to be spreading. That is _all_ we know."

"Boss," Blueski interjected. "If we lose network access, we lose my monitoring program."

"Good point. Dorado, when you cut us off, leave Blueski's computer connected. But make sure—I want you to physically tape over all the ports—that his computer is not connected to the rest of us."


	8. Volume 1, Chapter 6: Consideration

**Disclaimer:** you and I hereby make no claims to owning RWBY, and this is purely for our mutual entertainment (unless you happen to be affiliated with Rooster Teeth, in which case you can claim away but I can at least hope we find this mutually entertaining)

* * *

Volume 1, Chapter 6: Consideration

Forget about Cinder. And Salem. Evil societies bent on world domination. And people who relentlessly tried to do the 'right thing.'

You were going to kill Ozpin first.

It was the only way he could have made a 'mistake' by asking you to deliver something to Port…while class was in session.

"I know, perhaps a story!"

You stare at Professor Port. There is really nothing you would like less…okay, that's not strictly true. But it's pretty damn low on your list.

"I don't think that's a good idea," your reply is flat, though not as harsh as it could be.

"Nonsense!" Port booms. "A chance to impress the next generation of Huntsmen and Huntresses is not an opportunity to be squandered."

Put that way…

"Professor Port's probably been telling you stories of his youth where he illustrates how he defeated something evil so you know the best way to kill it."

"Indeed I have!" The man needs a volume, or at least an intensity setting.

"Yeah, most Grimm Studies instructors take that route." You sigh and run a hand through your cobalt-colored hair. "Okay. What the hell.

"The contract was a nuckelavee, which some of you have heard of but most of you haven't." Sorry Ren, Nora. "Think giant horse with claws instead of hooves, and a rider fused to its back and you get the general idea. The good news is, they're really rare. The bad news is, they like to depopulate frontier towns and then squat for a decade or two knocking off hunter teams before moving on to the next one.

"At that point, I was running with a company. My partner dating back to training was on medical leave, but I'd been fighting alongside Ashe and Beryl—" let's hear it for long-standing cover-names saving you from 'outing' people the younger-you hasn't even met yet, much less trying to explain that they're currently on the other side "—for a couple years at that point and my partner for the op, Ray Roy, had been with the company about as long. We also had two probies. Rouge had just graduated from Atlas, the rest of his team had been offered Specialist commissions—"

"But not Rouge?" Weiss sniffs.

Somehow, you aren't quite sure where, you'd forgotten what an utter brat she could be.

"He figured the odds were pretty good that the Specialists were intended to put down, if not deter, a…call it an internal dispute along species lines, and he was only interested in hunting Grimm. It was part of his contract, actually. No bounty work."

"Bounty work?" Jaune asks.

You do not sigh…but it's close.

"Occasionally there is an aura-enhanced individual, some may even have huntsmen training, who goes…outside the scope of the law. Mundane police forces are not equipped to handle such people. Now, may I continue?"

Nobody interrupts.

"Great. So, we had Rouge, and we also had J. Ewell Jones. Ewell was old, ancient even, and had more experience than any three of us in the company but almost all of it solo.

"Over time your affinity with your aura increases. The stories of huntsmen and huntresses who can rip apart whole packs of beowolves without twitching a muscle just from the strength of their aura? Perfectly true. Sort of. Those who stay in the field long enough to get that good are really, really rare. He wasn't quite that good, but he'd put in a _lot_ of field time."

You take a moment to collect your thoughts. "We knew we were going after a nuckelavee so we were running heavy. There are ways to take one down in close if you have to, but if you don't absolutely have to and are smart, you pack heavy. We had three light tactical vehicles with heavy weapon loads. But that was just for transport. The Grimm we were after was squatting in this mountain valley, but the only good way to it was a trail the vehicles couldn't hack. So when we got to the trail head we unassed the gear and got it on a bunch of mules with twelve days of supplies, two to get to the valley, two back, three to hunt and kill the grim, and two-thirds again extra just in case.

"First night, no problem. Second night, no problem. We found the nuckelavee and…dealt with it." And boy did it help having RNJR's account of how to do that. The heavy weapons were nice too. "First night heading back we ran into trouble.

"Hot camp or cold camp. The psychological benefits of a fire are well-established. Grimm aren't exactly afraid of fire, but a bunch of happy people don't attract them. Fire also makes a handy improvised weapon. But the downside is, there is nothing short of shining a spotlight in your eyes, or maybe smoking a cig, that will fuck up night-vision faster, it's easily seen by the bandits, and even if happy people don't attract grimm they can be smart enough to understand that where there is a controlled fire there are people. Since smart grimm tend to be older, more dangerous grimm, there is a reason why cold camps remain popular.

"We'd gone with a hot camp. There were no bandits in the area on account of the nuckelavee, and we'd just aced the biggest threat in the area. And Ewell's semblance was a danger sense. He knew when people talked behind his back. He knew who drew his name for the office holiday gift exchange. And the guy was impossible to pull a prank on…or for a grimm to sneak up on."

"Which is why he managed to stay alive as a solo hunter," Professor Port says.

"I know, right?" you ask.

"Why?" Yang asks.

"Solo hunting teaches self-reliance. Not a bad thing," you admit. "It also means there isn't someone around to catch your mistakes, or watch your back for beowolves coming up behind you while you're setting up to snipe a bandersnatch. Short answer, solo hunters either get really, really good, really, really fast…or don't live very long. Usually.

"Now… If there was a fire, Ray snored. Put him in a cold camp and he was silent as a rock. Fire? There are logging camps that are less noisy. So, when I woke and only really heard the fire I was pretty confused since Ray wasn't supposed to be on watch, but I figured Ewell had woken him up to spell him so he could water a tree or something."

From the looks Port and Blake are giving you they know what happened to Ray.

Oh well, the rest would learn soon enough.

"I felt something above me. No other way to put it. There wasn't time to shout, so I grabbed my weapon and opened fire right through the tent because there is nothing like gunfire to wake people up in a hurry. We were all in under single tents—basic tents, stretch of cloth over a taught line and held down at the corners. It was a warm night so my sleeping bag was unzipped. I grabbed my weapons and rolled right out of my tent in time to miss a huge fucking leg pounding my tent flat.

"Ashe lit it up, Rouge was nearly as fast, but Beryl got tangled in her tent and was slow getting her aura up and this big black leg came down and spiked her through her tent. Ewell joined us then, and Rouge pulled Beryl free. She was still alive. She had a hole clear through her I could put my fist through without touching her innards, but she was still alive. And Rouge had a semblance that could heal the most grievous injury. If Beryl had been in a trauma center she'd be dead. With Rouge, there was a chance she'd live." And you'd made it a priority to track and recruit him but that was in the future, right now he was even younger than Ruby. "But it took time and he couldn't benefit from his own aura while healing."

"So what kind of Grimm was it?" Yang bursts out. "Some giant troll?"

"A shelob, actually."

"Shelob?" Ruby asks.

"Shelob are arachnoform grimm," Port says.

"Basically a giant spider. They aren't as outright deadly as widowmakers," you add. "But those are a lot easier to kill and come in packs though they're harder to spot. Shelobs are just…big. Really big. And they soak damage like nobody's business. They can spit this stuff that causes your body to more or less…melt, and shoot webbing, and they have poison fangs, but the thing that tends to get huntresses and huntsmen dead is they can just take damage for forever. If you don't pace yourself you'll wear yourself out and then they eat you. Slowly. They've got this venom they inject that makes your flesh necrotize, but it leaves the nervous system alone. Actually, the stuff has a super-oxygenating compound so if you get enough of the stuff it'll actually keep your nervous system alive so you can feel your flesh rot into goo for it to drink.

"So, back to Ewell. Ewell was just as good as his records suggested. Ashe and I could in-fight, but we weren't brutes… This guy could tank and dish out. So, he got in close to keep it occupied while we stood off and hammered it from range. It was working too, sort of."

"What about going for their legs?" Jaune asks.

You look at him and he doesn't quite wilt, but then he surprises you by getting out a few more words.

"I mean, if they're spiders…"

"Pretty standard on arachnoforms to go for the knee-joints to cripple it," you agree. "Shelobs are fast. You'd be surprised how fast something that size can move. Also, black legs, black body, black forest at night, and a fire throwing shadows all over the place. Knees are relatively small targets. And, as I said, shelobs can just tank hits for forever. Good idea, but pretty much a non-starter.

"Ewell was thrown clear, his aura badly depleted, but Ashe and I were doing a real number on it. Until, as a final hurrah, it threw a rock the size of minibus at Rouge and Beryl. Ewell leapt in front of them so they survived, but he was really messed up.

"On the upside, that left it open for Ashe and I to kill the thing. Shelob's are loners so we thought that was that and we went to see if we could help our teammates. Ewell was messed up. He needed Rouge's help or a really top-notch trauma center. Beryl was healing, slowly, and still worse off than Ewell. Rouge was exhausted but hanging in there. I was nearly out of ammo and had taken some hits so my aura was low. The only one of us really ready to keep on going was Ashe. Most of the mules were dead. The heavy weapons—those not out of ammo from the nuckalevee—were totaled. Most of our reserve supplies were trash.

"That's when Ray came staggering up."

"He wasn't dead?"

You haven't been paying attention, too wrapped up in the memory, to catch who asks the question. But it doesn't really matter.

"That's what we thought. I mean, he wasn't in good shape. One leg was mangled and he was propped up on his weapon which was mostly scrap at that point. He came hobbling up to Rouge, and the flamethrower function on his weapon still worked, at least partially, because he poured fire over Rouge and Beryl."

"Wait," Nora interjects. " _What?_ "

"It's called a 'geist,'" you explain. "They're a spirit-form, possession-type grimm. They inhabit inanimate objects to use as bodies. In this case it'd possessed my partner's corpse and used his weapon to set two of my friends on fire while I was marveling at his survival."

"What'd you do?" Port asked after a while.

"I chopped Ray's body up and tossed it on the pyre that were Rouge and Beryl. Pinned the geist on it when it tried to emerge. And then I tossed the rest of Ray's burn dust on top of that. We got Ewell on the last of the mules and Ashe and I spent the night hurrying down to the village pumping as much of our aura into him as we dared.

"Too much, as it turned out. There was a bullhead in the village by the time we got there. We'd gotten an emergency call out, but the wind-shear off the mountains made it too dangerous to come in closer. If it hadn't been there to get us to a hospital we'd probably all have died. As it was we pretty much slept for a week."

"And Ewell?" Ruby asks.

"He survived. Recovered. In pretty good shape, actually. Good enough for field service, but he turned in his license and retired as soon as the hospital released him."

You look around. Some of them have gotten it, but most of them haven't.

"This isn't a safe profession, kids," you sigh. "The odds are pretty good that someone in this room is going to be dead before graduation. Probably more than one. What hit my team wasn't anything we hadn't seen before. Any one of us was better armed, better skilled, and more experienced than all of you. Any one of us could have handed you your collective heads without using semblance or a weapon. Compared to some of the stuff out there waiting to eat you, a shelob is not particularly dangerous and geists are usually more annoyance than threat.

"I still had half a team, dead.

"Maybe you could blame it on the shelob going after Ray instead of Ewell. Or on Ewell for his semblance not working the way he thought. The way his experience—which was considerable, more than the rest of our team combined at that point—had taught him it should work. Maybe without the fire Ewell might have seen the shelob in the first place, but possibly not. And if we'd gone with a cold camp maybe nightmares from fighting the nuckelavee would've brought something worse. Or I could take blame for Beryl and Rouge's deaths by not securing Ray Roy's body because I 'knew' shelobs are loners. Or we could all take blame because even if he wasn't asleep this time, we'd all let Ewell skate because he was willing to volunteer for watch and it meant more rack-time for the rest of us and we 'knew' his semblance would keep us safe.

"There was more than enough blame to go around. And past a certain point, it's academic. Things go wrong in the field, and when they do people die." You nod to Port who is not quite as jolly as normal. "Sorry for disrupting your class, Professor."

"Nonsense!" Port's laugh is just a little forced, but it's unlikely any of the students know him well enough yet to notice.

* * *

"What _is_ that?"

Eb shook his head. "I've never seen anything like it. Can we see what program is running?"

"The tech support password only gives us basic access. If the program is keyed to the department, or even user, we need those log-in credentials, or the master admin."

"Good luck getting that," Eb snorted. Though seriously, who else needed administrator access _more_ than them? "Okay. If we can't see the program directly, can we see where it's located?"

"That's just it. It doesn't look like it's located anywhere," Blueski said. "It's like the CPU is just…spinning. Like a kid that's bored and has to do _something_."

"Can we tell it do something else?"

"That's what we're doing looking through this."

"No. I'm thinking something more intensive. Something that would normally cause the CPU to actually do some work."

"Video of my cat?" Blueski lifted a datacube

Eb reached past Blueski and pulled out a fresh cube. "Get Corona to make a copy. I want the cube used to transfer it to this computer destroyed once you're done."

"Boss," Dorado said. "It's a glitch, not a plague."

"A glitch that is affecting how many computers in this building?"

Despite the gentle whirr of the computers, the watch center was as silent as any tomb.

"Boss, what exactly are you saying?" Corona asked.

"I don't know," Eb said. "But I doubt this was an accident." He pulled out his scroll, cursing that the morning watch supervisor was also his next-higher.

After an interminable time a blurry voice asked: "wha?"

"Boss, it's Eb Oda of the ni—"

"D'you kno' wha' time it ezz?" the voice snorted.

"Yes. We have a situation, and—"

"Oo are nigh' wasssh… Deal wi' it." The connection ended.

Well…shit.

"Victoria," he said.

"I can do a soft-crash of our system," Victoria said. "It won't last long, the system itself will fix it. But anything harder and we're looking at real equipment damage, probably. Certainly something that'll take days, if not longer, to clean up. I've also located junctions in the building. Three of them. If we disconnect those, we cut the building from the network."

Eb nodded. "Go. Do it now. In the meantime, Corona, I want you to set up a conference call with every current on-duty regional watch supervisor, and as many facilities that have someone on-duty. A live someone, not a recording or AI.

"Blueski, are we sure that only HQ is affected?"

"I think so," Blueski said. "But HQ is the only place where I can look at detailed power usage like this. I can look at facility power usage, and they look normal. But we're still in daytime mode in Vacuo and Mistral."

"What about other Atlas and Vale facilities?"

"Normal so far. But we'd never see it if only a few computers were affected."

"And it only takes one."

* * *

"I'm sorry, all of our operators are currently busy…"

"Do you know who I am?"

"I'm sorry, all—"

That was a recording, not even the proper AI!

Jacques Schnee made a short, sharp movement with his hand and the call terminated. He thought for a moment, then stabbed a finger down on his desk intercom. "Klein, have my vehicle brought around. I will be going into the office after all." He terminated the link before his butler could reply.

He gestured at the wall panel. "Call Augustus Black, direct."

Black answered up on the second ring, just as he had every other time Jacques had ever called him. He was a tall man. Dark skinned with black hair touched with silver at the temples. He had a fondness for black, three-piece suits, a weathered face, and had been the Head of Security for the SDC World Headquarters since the day Jacques had become president. What was less well-known, was that he was also in charge of the Schnee family's personal security, and prosecuting the SDC's clandestine war against the White Fang.

"Why are the scroll and computer lines to the office down?"

"The corporate electronic network has been shut down," Augustus said. "It's not just Headquarters. It's global. Every regional headquarters, research facility, mine, refining and processing facility… All of the networks have been physically disabled."

"An attack?" Jacques asked. That…wasn't possible.

"No. The order came from inside."

"Who? Why?"

"The night watch supervisor for the tech support center. One…" he glanced down at something, "Eb Oda." He looked up at Jacques again. "They 'why' is less clear. I've been told there was an attack, but our security reports no disturbances. I've had a visual inspection done. Headquarters, your residence, and tier three and higher Atlas facilities have reported back nominal. It will be some hours before lower tiers and out-Kingdom facilities have finished their checks. There has been no chatter from any of my sources, and nobody has made claim to any attack."

"Fire him," Jacques said. "His whole watch team. They should have had better sense than to let him do…whatever it was he was thinking. Just…take their IDs and escort them out. We can ship them their personal effects once we fix whatever mess they've made of things. Can building maintenance fix whatever they did?"

"I checked, and they say they can. It's simply a matter of swapping in a removed part."

"Well there's that at least."

"I take it you'll be coming in?"

"Of course," Jacques said. "And I'll want to see Rufus when I get in."

* * *

Rufus Tucci was a tall, broad-shouldered man with thick-fingered hands, and a bushy red hair and beard. Coupled with a deep, resonant voice and blunt features, he looked like he belonged in some lumber camp, helped along by a preference for blue jeans and plaid shirts. He was also one of the most tech-savvy and media-communications-literate people Jacques had ever met, and Jacques had spun those qualities—and, admittedly, those of other people—into becoming President of the SDC at the same time Rufus had leveraged is way into his own vice-presidency. Admittedly, he was good at it or Jacques would never have allowed him to remain, but for the first time he was beginning to regret it.

"We've been attacked," Rufus said bluntly. "That's the conclusion of my department, anyway."

Augustus snorted. "No damage. Not even a protest that caused some minor traffic delays—"

"It wasn't an attack on our physical infrastructure," Rufus said. "It attacked our computer networks."

"Which Augustus and I have dealt with," Jacques said.

Rufus blinked. "You have?"

Jacques snorted. "It wasn't hard to identify the man responsible. What I want to know is why I had to do it."

" _You_ identified the one responsible," Rufus asked skeptically.

"Eb Oda," Augustus said. "As Mr. Schnee said, it wasn't hard."

Rufus stared at Augustus. "Oda was the one who identified that we were _attacked_."

"Don't be ridiculous. Augustus has already verified that Oda was the one who deliberately ordered—"

"It wasn't an attack! That was preventing the situation from getting worse!"

Jacques glared at Rufus. No one interrupted him. _Ever_. But Rufus had also helped engineer his efforts to cement his place in the SDC, and for the first time Jacques could recall he looked decidedly…flapped. "Explain," he said coldly.

"A computer is a lot like the drive wheels on a vehicle," Rufus said slowly, his voice taking on the cadence of someone using what had become a stock analogy. "The wheels spin, the vehicle moves. The wheels don't spin, the vehicle doesn't move. The computer, specifically the CPU, cycles, things get done. It doesn't cycle…they don't.

"This morning, Eb Oda, a member of his team actually, figured out that computers in this building that shouldn't have been doing anything, were acting like wheels that were spinning— _after_ being lifted off the ground. While powering off the computer stopped this, the problem resumed when they were turned back on."

"Where, exactly, is the problem?" Jacques asked. "A vehicle that isn't going anywhere isn't doing anything."

"Exactly," Rufus said. "They are going nowhere…but _acting_ as though they are. We can't stop them. And the problem was spreading. Eb disconnected our networks before it could spread beyond this building. That wouldn't do anything good for this company, but what would happen if it spread beyond this facility would be worse."

"How much worse?" Augustus asked.

Rufus blinked, and gave the security chief a look very much like bewildered surprise. "Computer support is essential for many day-to-day operations at the majority of our facilities. Anything from processing and refining equipment, to delivery scheduling, to making sure we all get our paychecks on time. Most of our high-end R&D relies heavily on integrated computer support, as do perimeter defenses at our out-Kingdom facilities."

He slowly turned towards Jacques. "What did you do, Jacques?" he asked in a soft tone.

"You don't speak to me in that tone," Jacques said in the same tone.

"You always did like hard, decisive action," Rufus said, " _and_ you hired me because I covered your blindside on info-tech. So I ask again: What did you do, Jacques?"

Jacques didn't reply for several long moments. "I fired Oda and his team."

Rufus nodded slowly. "And reconnected the networks, no doubt. Augustus, building maintenance, I presume? Call them up. Get them to undo their fix."

Augustus turned to Jacques.

"Do it right now!" Rufus insisted.

"Mr. Schnee…"

Jacques gave Rufus a level look. "If you are wrong, you are fired."

Rufus snorted. "And if I'm not wrong you'll blame me the way you did Oda?"

"Don't test me," Jacques said, his voice lethally soft.

"I'm not," Rufus said.

After a moment Jacques turned back to Augustus. "Do as he says."

"And our other facilities," Rufus said. "Tell them to cut their internal networks until we can determine if it's spread."

"How long will it take to fix?" Jacques asked.

"No idea," Rufus said. "Right now, we're still trying to figure out how it works. The one 'fix' we've got so far is replacing every computer that's…infected, I suppose."

"Infected?" Augustus asked.

"One of Eb's people compared it to a plague. The comparison's stuck," Rufus shrugged. He turned back to Jacques. "You had better hope that this is just us."

"Why?"

"Because we can pull the plug on our own infrastructure," Rufus replied. "Oh, our efficiency will tank. If we have to physically replace everything it'll mean a lot of our production lines will have to be at least temporarily halted. I don't want to think about our mine sites. And it'll cost. You can't replace that much hardware without it costing. But all of that is recoverable. If this gets out onto the public nets there will be no stopping it. It'll hit every open network on the planet. And if that happens, it'll only take one mouth to say that we designed this and it got away from us."

"That's ridiculous," Jacques said. "If we designed it, we could fix it."

"Probably," Rufus agreed. "Possibly, anyway. But I told you this feud you have with the White Fang would be dangerous back before you started it. And you've told me often enough over the years that faunus are allergic to the truth. If this goes public, they'd be perfectly positioned to insure it spread, and we might have the chance for both of us to be right."

* * *

Eb stared at the pale-yellow sun and shivered. It was still early enough to be bitterly cold despite the season, and none of them had been allowed to get their coats or other personal items before security had escorted them from the building. They didn't have access to corporate parking either which left the little question of how any of them were supposed to get home up in the air, and—

An airbus, one of the big, expensive kind, settled onto its landing pads. A moment later the doors folded open and steps extended and the driver—in a coat—stepped out. "Eb Oda?"

"Me," Eb said.

"And this is your team?" the driver asked. "My name's Bruno. I'm your ride."

"Our ride?" Eb asked in confusion.

"Yeah."

Eb looked at the others. Blueski shrugged, and the others shook their heads or gave similar responses. "I'm sorry," he said, turning back to Bruno. "We don't know what this is about."

Bruno pursed his lips. "All I know is, I'm supposed to pick you up and deliver you to the aero-port. There's someone who's supposed to teleconference in to speak with you. And those that don't want to get off, I deliver to any address within thirty minutes of the city limits that they want to give me."

"Well that covers how I'm getting home," Veronica said. "C'mon. Let's get out of this cold."

That seemed to make up the minds of the rest of his team and they quickly filed in.

It was nice. Very, very nice. Roomier than he'd thought from the outside. Dim, but not oppressively so, with rich wood trim. The seats were large, deep, and almost sinfully comfortable, and a coffee maker with choices that started at 'expensive' and went up from there.

Eb got coffee, traded inconsequential nothings with two of his (former?) colleagues, and tried to distract Rosetta who'd been only two months into her first job and looked to be in shock. He glanced out the window to find SDC headquarters falling away below them. They'd taken off at some point and the ride was so smooth he hadn't even noticed.

A tone drew attention to a wall panel on the forward bulkhead that suddenly lit up. A young woman with painfully dark skin appeared. She wore a pale green smock, and was sitting in a room that would have been shockingly white on its own even without the contrast of its occupant.

"Hello. My name is Amy Chiaroscuro, and I would like to speak to you about a proposal…"

* * *

"Any idea what this special training is going to be?" Jaune asked.

"Oooh," Nora said. "It could be how to improvise weapons or—"

"None," Pyrrha replied. "Ruby?"

"—big explosions or—"

"Only that it was only offered to a handful of teams, mostly upper years."

"—slay dragons or—"

"I suppose it wouldn't be secret if everyone knew what it was," Weiss sniffed.

"—air assault via rocket-locker or—"

"CRDL was offered a shot," Yang said.

Everyone, even Nora, stopped to look at her.

"You're joking," Ruby said.

"Nope. They declined."

"But… _nobody_ declined," Weiss said.

"CRDL, or at least Cardin did. And he's pretty much CRDL."

The two teams followed the winding path around the last curve, past the cluster of trees that screened Beacon Academy from the cliff overlooking the Emerald Forest. There were a half-dozen other teams already present, but only one that Ruby really recognized. Of course, CFVY wasn't exactly unnoticeable.

"Dust," one of the upperclassmen Ruby didn't recognize swore. "They're sending little kids in? How special can this be if even the puppies are getting it?"

The upperclassman jumped as a hand settled on his shoulder. He was reaching for his weapon before he touched ground, but another hand held it firmly in its scabbard as he was spun around.

* * *

"Who are you? How'd you get here?" the upperclassman demands.

"The training I am offering isn't special despite their presence, Mr. Bole," you reply. Ozpin might have insisted you offer training to more teams that you ever intended to, which is why you made offers to some teams that you knew wouldn't accept…or that you could (mostly) intimidate, trick, or otherwise encourage to drop out. "It's special despite yours.

"On the other hand, I _can_ tell you that I wanted no more than twelve students, all in their first or second year. The Headmaster insisted I extend invitations to select teams in their third or fourth year as well. However, if you feel that what I have to teach you is somehow beneath you, you are free to depart."

"Just like that?" Bole asked. "It won't affect class standing?"

"None of my courses affect class standing, Mr. Bole," you point out. "Therefor, this course isn't for credit. Ergo, were you to ace the material—and you won't—it would not affect your class standing."

"Then I'm gone."

"I'm sorry to hear that. Ms. Plaine, Team SABR is dismissed."

"But—"

"I am sorry, Sandy," first name, because Sandra Plaine is a decent human being even if her partner is a conceited ass whose main concern is his image and branding, "but I will not have someone in this class who does not want to be here. Nor will I have a team in this class that is incomplete. Either all take it, or none, and Mr. Bole has made his decision."

You have to wait, but when it finally becomes clear to her that you aren't changing your mind she shakes her head and leads her team away.

You wait a moment longer before turning to your students. "Behind me are two boulders. Yang, pick one and destroy it. No weapons. And don't use your semblance."

Yang doesn't hesitate, walking past you and popping the first boulder with a right that started somewhere in last week and ended in two boulders that looked like they could be fused together with just a little glue.

"Now watch." You calmly walked to the second boulder, extended a hand, and lightly touched it with a finger. Your aura quests out, finding the cracks, the tiny pockets of moisture, the voids, seeking where one mineral is pressed against another… Then you shove your aura into it.

The boulder instantly collapsed in a pile of dust. You turn on your heel, and a third boulder behind the class promptly vanished in an explosion that rocks Jaune back on his heels, and ruffles clothes and hair while bombarding your students with bits and pieces of gravel.

"That," you say as the echoing rumbles of the explosions melt away, "is a high-level projective application of what you will be learning."

"Okay but…what the hell was that?" Jaune calls out. It is…somewhat impressive that he is the first to ask the question everyone else clearly wants to ask, especially considering his proximity and…other inadequacies. Or perhaps those inadequacies are what allows him to reach past what makes the others hesitate?

"That," Ren says calmly, "was aura manipulation. _Active_ aura manipulation." He gives you a wary look. "I thought it was a myth."

It isn't a myth, but it also isn't what you'd done. The gross effects were the same, but how you got there was rather different. Still…time enough to explain that later.

"And we'll be doing that when we're done?" Jaune asks, a mixture of fear and excitement in his voice.

"No," you reply, shaking your head. "Mr. Lie, you seem to be at least somewhat aware. Would you care to take a try at enlightening your peers?"

"Our auras provide us with a set of basic tools," Ren says. "With practice those tools can manifest in different ways and amounts, but they remain the same tool."

"Um…huh?" Nora is staring at her best friend, and she is not alone.

"If I may?" Ren asks.

You make a gesture with your hand and he walks off into the trees and returns in a moment with a stick.

"This is a lever," Ren says. "It can be used many ways. To move a rock more easily, or to drive a nail—"

"Or break someone's legs!" Nora added.

"But for all the uses I can put it to, it remains a lever."

"And the problem with this?" Yang asks.

"Its efficiency is limited," Yatsuhashi states. "For all the tasks we can put aura too, it remains a simple tool. One would not use a maul for all tasks that call for hammer. Some tasks require, or at least would benefit from, something more specialized."

"Those who master basic aura manipulation are a little more diverse than that," you say dryly. "Metaphor is always somewhat suspect but to continue Mr. Daichi's; what I am going to try to teach you, will provide you with a comprehensive toolbox."

"How is that different from what we do now?" Velvet asks.

"Aura is…passive," Ren doesn't look terribly pleased with the word he'd chosen, but he doesn't change it either. "It enhances us, makes us more. It is protection, yes, and also makes us jump higher, run further and faster and for longer, our weapons sharper, hit harder, and more durable… It allows us to perform feats that are beyond the capability of purely physical, even with copious amounts of time spent on training. This not only makes us capable of facing the creatures that would destroy us, Grimm or not, but it also frees our time to study other things, combat techniques, history, how to fight Grimm."

It's not quite the longest speech you've ever heard out of him, but it's probably close.

"It is also limited," you add, "both in efficiency, and what you can do with it."

"But…" Ruby's protest dies away, she frowns at you, clearly thinking hard. "If it's inefficient, shouldn't we have classes to make us better with it?"

"You do," you reply. "Does anyone want to chance a guess how?"

BLZE, HRLQN, and CFVY are all watching, but not really answering, content to let the first years do all, or at least most, of the engagement. That's fine, for now at least, but you make a mental note to make sure they don't slack off.

"Let me put it this way. You all know by now how classes work at Beacon," you say. You aren't quite sure how RWBY had stumbled onto that little tidbit, and you didn't even need to suggest that they share it with JNPR. Just as well, really. You've thrown enough other stuff at Ruby and Jaune that you throwing more at them would have been…problematic, and you weren't sure there was anything particularly subtle you could do. "What one class do you have with a fixed schedule that you have to be in attendance for?"

"Professor Goodwitch," Ruby said, shivering slightly.

"Why?" you ask.

"Because it's Professor Goodwitch?" Jaune asks. "I mean, that's good enough for me."

A couple of others chuckle.

"A worthy answer," you say. "Why, though. What specific reason does she have for teaching what she does, in the way she does?"

"Clearly she wants us to win the Vytal Tournament," Weiss said, but you can see Pyrrha start to nod, but then frown.

"Pyrrha, something to add?"

"The matchups, the way she throws specific teams together, doesn't conform to the Vytal Tournament's organization," Pyrrha says. "And the arena is very different."

"Definitely a point. Any others want to try to answer?" you ask. But no one does.

"The simple answer is, she's training your aura," you reply. "The more you use it, the better you get, the more you can do with it, and the more efficient you become. The problem, is that there are very few things capable of truly taxing anyone's aura. Professor Port captures a very few Grimm for his class, certainly not enough for the whole student body to fight them on a regular basis, which leaves her to pair you against each other. It is a technique that is efficient, effective, and safe. More to the point. Your affinity with your aura will only ever continue to increase. Theoretically, there is no maximum limit, but as a practical matter most people die or retire first. What Professor Goodwitch's class does, is strengthening your aura so that its efficiency, and what you can do with it, is enough to keep you alive after graduation."

Everyone is trading looks at that. A couple of the older teams have their heads together and are whispering furiously back and forth. Since I'm not pinging you to anything that needs immediate attention, you let your mind drift for a moment to wondering why nobody explained why Goodwitch taught what she did. It's pretty impractical for Grimm, and most people with activated auras are varied enough in technique and weapon set that they aren't likely to meet up with a bounty-target that mimics someone they ran with in school.

"I'm going to guess there are some pretty big downsides," Fox says. "Otherwise it'd be a normal part of the curriculum."

"It's dangerous," Ren says. "The projection techniques like Professor bar-Adama just used run the risk of Aura Detachment."

"What is…?" Jaune starts, but is quickly interrupted by Ren.

"It's exactly as it sounds. Your aura becomes detached from your body, and you run the risk of never getting it back."

"There is also the chance that something else will enter your body while your aura is…elsewhere." You give them a pointed smile. "Which is, of course, why we will not be studying those techniques…at least not this semester."

"So what will we be learning, then?" Blaise (no last), is the leader the other 2nd-year team to be taking the class.

"I will be teaching you the foundations of aura manipulation, and basic aura enhancement. Essentially, how to use your aura to heal yourself, run faster, hit harder, and fight longer."

"But we already know how to use our auras," Nora said. She crosses her eyes and her body briefly glows a faint pink as she activates, and then deactivates, her aura.

"As it currently stands, all of you have unlocked auras. In that they provide a degree of resilience, some physical enhancement, improved healing. A few of you know how to unlock—or, I understand 'activate' is the current parlance in Vale—another's aura. One or two of you know how to do a bit more. All of these are things you will learn through normal class experience, but otherwise your aura is a passive thing over which you have little control once you have moved beyond the basics of even having it.

"With time that will change. How much depends upon how much time and effort you spend practicing, and on a great deal of luck. However, with basic aura manipulation you will never be able to do more than place refinement upon existing techniques, yet a huntress or huntsman with that degree of control is a power to be reckoned with.

"What I am offering is a more…personal touch. Something that will give you a great deal more personal control in how your abilities with aura develop. It will allow you channel your aura more efficiently. The tasks you can put it to are more diverse and specialized. Much of the luck is taken out of the equation. You cannot change how much aura you have, at least not easily. But imagination, your ability to come up with new uses, and improvise with the techniques you know, become the true limiting factors."

"This sounds very useful," Weiss says suspiciously. "Why has it not been taught before? Why teach us now?"

You sit cross-legged, and motion for the students to do the same. "Both excellent questions. Ren's answer to your question about projection techniques holds true for this as well. It's dangerous. In a very real way, it is taking your life into your hands. On the other hand, it means that if you want to put all of your aura into an unstoppable offense, or unbeatable defense, you can."

"See?" Fox asks. "Useful."

"Don't quite your day job," Coco advises.

"Yeah," Yang said. "I'm the puny one!"

Ruby shakes her head. "Blake."

Blake reaches over and smacks her partner in the back of the head.

"If you fail to allocate your Aura efficiently you place yourself at a disadvantage," Ren notes. "Also, it is my understanding that this technique effectively replaces an activated aura."

"It replaces what an activated aura will do naturally, yes," you agree. "And thus we arrive at one of the crucial weaknesses of active aura manipulation. And that is, once you start you cannot stop.

"Once you take your first step you cannot go back. There is no 'reset button'. No option to quit. A mistake can easily result in your death. And if you cannot master the technique, it is impossible to go back to the old way of doing things. Without aura, your career as a huntsman would end before it ever began.

"In taking that first step, you are making a commitment to learn to utilize your aura in ways few can imagine…eventually. You are also, however, making yourself critically vulnerable in the short term. Until you learn to consciously use your aura to do what has until now been an _un_ conscious action, your aura will neither shield you, nor heal you, nor physically empower you. You will, in short, be as utterly vulnerable as one without an activated aura…while attending an Academy where it is assumed you will have an activated aura protecting you."

"That is a heck of a downside," Jaune says.

And coming from him that's not ironic at all.

"There has to be more to it," Weiss insists. "Why else is it only being offered now?"

"The reason, Weiss it has not been taught is four-fold. We have already discussed the first. Second is more complicated. How much do you, any of you, know about the soul? And I'm not interested in ontological or theological arguments."

"It exists?" asked Kelly Phillips of Team HRLKN, one of Beacon's few five-person teams.

There had been almost six hundred students taking part in Initiation, split between three 'waves.' Twenty 'relics' per wave usually netted ten, four-person teams, with a total class-size of a hundred twenty which was…low, for a school the size of Beacon. Something else to ask Ozpin about if you can find a way to work it into the conversation. Those students unable to recover a relic had been sent home, but were free to apply again for the next Initiation slot.

Occasionally events transpired so that one person made 'eye contact' with two people at close enough to the same time to make determining partners…difficult. Actually, according to Ozpin, it wasn't unknown for some partners, or even full teams, to…reconfigure themselves during Initiation, provided they did so before returning with the relic.

Considering how shitty teenagers are capable of being, you aren't sure if that 'hands off' policy is even more despicable than what passes for an anti-bullying policy. Still, it seems to have worked out okay this year so it's another thing that gets a pass because you don't have time to do anything about it. If you're still around—for that matter, if Beacon is still around—come next year, you may need to do something about it. For now, it'll keep.

Since HRLKN's records don't indicate a fatality, it seems that one of them had 'partnered' with two people. You have decided that you do not want to know how they settled the matter of fitting five people into one of Beacon's dorm rooms.

"It is questionable whether or not even that is true," you say. "Oh, the vast majority accept it as valid. But for definitive proof, there is remarkable little to substantiate it.

"There is, however, is a great deal of anecdotal evidence. But very little that is measurable. What is known, is that a person with an activated aura is more attractive to Grimm than someone without. Whether it is because an activated aura ties the soul more closely to the surface of the body, or it makes our emotions 'brighter' to the Grimm, or 'louder', or something else entirely. Grimm will ignore civilians to target people with activated auras. They can demonstrably sense activated auras at ranges that they cannot sense a person with an _in_ activated aura.

"Incidentally, this, beyond even that those whose soul is strong enough to support an activated aura are fairly uncommon, is one of the primary reasons why there has been no move to unlock civilians' auras wholesale.

"However, this…difference of reaction, is important to keep in mind. Given a choice between a huntsman with an unlocked aura, and one capable of actively manipulating their aura as I intend to teach, a Grimm will respond to the latter much as they would a normal huntsman over a civilian."

"That is not a minor concern," Hunter Murchie, Kelly's team leader, murmured. Then, more loudly, "they can do a threat analysis…at least enough to sense which is the greater potential threat. Does it index? I mean, if a really top-notch huntsman with just an activated aura is out there, and one of us who've just learned the technique, they'll peg us as the greater threat?"

"Yep," you reply, and let that dangle of their heads for a moment.

"Third, just like those capable of supporting an activated aura are a small part of the civilian population, and those with an activated aura capable of unlocking the auras of others is likewise small, so too the number of those who are talented and experienced enough with this technique to both instruct others _and_ save them from their mistakes is very small. Lastly, the potential for someone who knows just enough of how to do something, without understanding what they are doing or why, to injure themselves or others is very high."

"If this isn't taught, how do people usually learn it?" Pyrrha asked.

"They don't," you say bluntly. "Many huntsmen and huntresses pick up a wide range of skills and talents that serve them well in the field without ever being formally taught them. Since aura, and the ability to use it grows in proportion how extensively you use it, most huntsmen and huntresses who live long enough become…prodigious weapons with just the basic tools they have.

"You are all, quite simply, an experiment to discover whether or not these techniques can be taught without you destroying yourselves or each other. The danger is perhaps somewhat overstated, but it is both very real, and easily overlooked. You will also, at least within your teams, become intimately familiar with each other of a level that is more profound than many married couples. If you are uncomfortable with the idea of not being able to have secrets from your team, even personal thoughts potentially, this is not a class you should be taking."

"You can teach us to shield though, right?" Jaune asks. "To keep each other out of our heads?"

"This isn't an artifact of a novel you read last week," he flinches at your tone which was, perhaps, a little more severe than really called for, but… "You aren't going to be, as you put it, in each other's heads. You will, however, be working and practicing together, with the very nature of your souls. That type of thing is not without consequence."

You stand. "Take some time. Talk it over. My office ours are posted, and both e-contact and scroll-number are in Beacon's contact directory. If you need to talk to me, do so. Come to a decision as a team, but make a decision that is right for you."


	9. Volume 1, Chapter 7: Lessons

**Disclaimer: Again, ownership is specifically disclaimed. Also, I meant this to be posted earlier today, but it's still Friday so woo.**

* * *

"Dust prices really went up overnight," Ruby said as she sat her dinner tray down.

"I thought we could draw on Beacon's Dust magazine free of charge," Blake said.

"We can," Ruby said. "But we won't once we graduate. I think they post the prices to keep us conscious of what it costs to be a huntress."

"There was an accident at a Dust mine in Atlas yesterday morning," Weiss said.

Blake flinched.

"What is it?" Yang asked.

"Dust mine accidents…don't tend to leave survivors," Weiss said softly.

"Most of the miners were probably faunus," Blake said. "And most Dust mines are tiny hamlets, with a defensive perimeter. An accident, the emotions left over, will bring a determined attack by Grimm. And since most are located outside the Kingdoms, they aren't subject to Kingdom oversight where things like safety conditions are concerned."

"Blowing out a mine and needing to replace the equipment and workers is not in the long-term interest of the SDC."

"Yet it happens anyway."

Ruby tensed, ready to leap between Weiss and Blake.

"You're right."

"I—what did you say?" Blake asked, at least as surprised as Ruby at Weiss' concession.

"I said you're right," Weiss said. "We both are. It doesn't make good business sense. And it does happen anyway. And neither of us can change things. Can we?"

"No." Blake looked down at her own tray. "I don't suppose we can."

"Did you…lose someone in a mine accident?" Yang asked.

"Not me personally," Blake replied. "But a…friend did."

"And on a happier note, this is for you," Ruby put a sealed case on the table and pushed it across the Blake.

Blake looked at Ruby and raised an eyebrow, but pulled the case over.

"Presents?" Weiss asked.

"Sorta?" Ruby replied with a shrug. "I finished making up some cartridges for Crescent Rose earlier than I thought it'd take, and I was just thinking and the Dust magazine was _right there_ so I decided to experiment a little."

Blake flipped the latches and lifted the cover. "Ammunition?"

"Dust rounds," Ruby said. "I figure, others can infuse Dust into their semblances. Well, not me or Yang, obviously. But you never mentioned trying it so I made up some rounds to see if you can. If they work we'll have to see if we can come up with a different delivery system though. I don't like the idea of compromising your weapon, and you may not have time to reload and if you need to switch types… Maybe some kind of wand or, oh, we could build it into the sheath."

"You might want to use some caution," Yang warned. "Ruby's formulations for class tend to be…overly energetic."

"I got Weiss to double check my calculations," Ruby said.

"When?" Weiss frowned.

"That, uh, extra homework you helped me with last night? Well... It wasn't actually homework," Ruby said in a rush. "I mean, it was, just not, you know, for-class homework."

Weiss sighed. "Never mind, then. For once Ruby has done an adequate job…so long as she managed to repress her incessant need to…tinker. Too bad she won't actually get credit for it."

"Hey," Ruby objected.

* * *

The beep of the door locking was enough to throw off Nora's rhythm. Instead of landing squarely she only managed to get one foot under her in time to go rocketing back up. She continued the rotation into a forward flip. A soft, percussive _whampf_ thudded through the dorm as she landed flat on her back.

"Pre-fluffing complete," Nora said from somewhere in her mattress.

"Why did you put a security lock on the door?" Pyrrha asked Jaune.

Instead of replying, he crossed to the window, pulled it shut, and bolted it before sliding the curtain across it.

"We need to talk," he said. "Or…or I need to talk."

"Is it about what Professor bar-Adama said in class?" Pyrrha asked.

"Yes. No." Jaune shook his head. "It's about what she spoke to me about in our…uh, interview, I guess. Team Leader briefing."

"She seems dangerously well-informed," Ren murmured.

"Yeah, tell me about it," Jaune said. "Okay, um…the thing is, I don't know how much longer I'll be around."

"You're not dying, are you?" Nora asked instantly. "You are! What is it? Cancer? Ebola? Fibrodysplasia ossificans progressiva?"

"No. No. Is that—Uh," he quickly counted. " _No_. No. No. Is that even real?"

"Yep!"

"Well then: no to…whatever that last one was." Jaune sat on his desk. "I'm not dying. No one I know is dying. I'm not quitting."

"You think you'll be thrown out," Ren said.

"What?" Nora asked. "Ren! How could you even think that? I mean, even _I_ wouldn't say it out loud, not that I'd ever think it in the first place."

"It seems the logical answer, if he isn't dying or leaving voluntarily."

"It's a possibility," Jaune said before Nora could argue further.

"But-but _why_?" Nora asked plaintively.

"Because…" Jaune sighed. "Look. You know what you had to do to get into this place."

"Yes," Ren said.

"Well…I did what Ruby did. I impressed Ozpin and he offered me a shot."

"You impressed Professor Ozpin?" Pyrrha asked.

"What'd you do?" Nora asked. "Oh. Wait. Don't tell me. Let me guess."

"I put together an application packet, and the only truthful thing in it were my name and birthdate," Jaune said. "An application that just happened to be good enough to get past all the filters that were supposed to prevent someone from doing just that."

"Jaune…"

"Huh."

"I so totally would not have guessed that."

"So…I don't really have the skill set to be here. Ozpin obviously knows," Jaune continued, looking away from Nora's pout. "And Professor bel-Adama knows. He's… Professor bar-Adama made it clear Ozpin isn't going to throw me out. I don't know if he intends me as some kind of…demonstrative example to the dangers of being a huntsman, or what. But she's going to give Ozpin a chance to be right…or maybe for me to quit. Whichever comes first."

"But…but why?" Nora asked again.

Jaune smiled, it was hard not to at the mournful note in Nora's voice. It wasn't even a bitter smile, more…bittersweet.

"You ever take a look at that statue out front?"

"Of course," Nora said.

"Well…take a closer look at the sword next time."

"Crocea Mors?" Pyrrha asked.

"Dear ol' great-great-granddaddy Arc. Breaker of Armies," Jaune chuckled mirthlessly. "The Arcs were huntsmen back before there _were_ huntsmen. Warriors. Soldiers. Crocea Mors is old. Like, really old. As old as the family, if you believe the family histories. And we're good at it too. Buuut it's also gotten a lot of us killed."

"Ouch," Nora said.

"Yeah. Dad is…well, it's important to him that there continues to be an Arc family and now it's down to just us, and he can't have any more kids so…"

"I thought you said you were from a large family," Nora said.

"Seven sisters. No brothers. Dad's old-fashioned that way. Anyway, he was pretty much dead set against me ever becoming a huntsman."

"So, you figured out a different way to get in," Pyrrha said softly.

"Pretty much."

"What brought all of this on?" Nora asked.

"He wants to continue Professor bar-Adama's class. It would put him at the same level as every other student."

Jaune nodded. Trust Ren to distil it down to the simplest level. He turned to his partner. "Pyrrha."

"I have been doing intensive aura-training for years," Pyrrha said.

"Yeah. Exactly."

Ren looked over at his teammate. "How important is winning the Vytal Tournament to you?"

Pyrrha looked at him.

"We are discussing you needing to relearn what has been a major component of your combat technique," Ren said.

"You've been fighting in tournaments for years," Jaune said. "We…haven't."

Pyrrha started to reply, but then she stopped and looked away. "It matters more than I want to admit it does. Tournaments have been the center of my life for so long… The Vytal Tournament may not be the one with the most money, or greatest standings attached to it. But it's the one everyone knows." She looked away with a troubled expression.

"Would not performing well cause problems with your sponsors?" Ren asked.

"No," Pyrrha said with a definitive shake of her head. "Vytal is team-oriented, even if the finals are solo-combatants. Academies sponsor their own teams and guard them jealously. My sponsors could put their own team together—actually, one of them is going to do just that—and enter them, but they can't touch us."

"But?" Jaune asked.

Pyrrha sighed and looked away. "But if my technique is noticeably sub-par, or more improved than a normal year at Beacon would account for, there would be…awkward questions asked."

"Match fixing?" Ren asked.

"There'd be nothing to find," Pyrrha said. "But that wouldn't stop rumors. That could cause some problems for all of us down the road."

"Uh…all of us?" Jaune repeated.

"It would be damaging to our reputations as huntresses and huntsmen," Pyrrha said.

"I, uh, but you…you want to be a huntress?" Jaune asked.

"I'm here, aren't I?" Pyrrha asked.

Jaune had grown up surrounded by his mother, seven sisters, and their (almost always) female friends, his cousins, and his aunts, and more than a few female friends of his own growing up. Everything in Pyrrha's last statement, the four carefully chosen words, the tone, the set of her shoulders, the way her eyes narrowed slightly, screamed 'Danger!'

And, like any professional huntsman (and teenage boy), he decided to poke the trap.

"But you're Pyrrha Nikos," he said.

But instead of an explosion, or withering scorn, or any of the other sub-apocalyptic responses he'd come to expect, Pyrrha's shoulders hunched in and her head ducked slightly, and he felt something inside him twist unpleasantly. She stood, crossing to the curtained window, and leaned her forehead against it.

"I've been…blessed."

'Blessed' sounded rather like the last thing she thought she was, Jaune reflected as Pyrrha spoke. 'Cursed' maybe, or perhaps tormented. Blighted? That wasn't a word that was used often. Burdened, that was better. Cursed or burdened.

Maybe blighted. Not used very often or…not, it was still a good word.

And the more she spoke, the more he realized just how misleading those Leader Files were. Ren and Nora's was pretty obvious, and he'd lived through his own home life. But Pyrrha's made her life seem like any kid's dream…except listening to her, it _had_ been a dream. Or, more accurately, at least for her, it had been a nightmare.

"I want…something real with my life," she concluded. "Something normal."

Mother. Seven sisters. Cousins. Aunts. And…he had no real idea of how to handle a partner/teammate who was…having an existential crisis? Reevaluating life choices? Having a breakdown?

What would Ruby do? Jaune asked himself.

He got up, crossed to Pyrrha, and quietly hugged her. For a moment her body went tense, but only for a moment, then she relaxed against his body but didn't pull away from the window.

"I'm not sure most would consider being a huntress normal," Ren observed.

Jaune looked over at Ren, the observation was true, but hardly—

Nora laughed, and Pyrrha shivered and it took Jaune a moment to realize she was giggling.

Okay, so Ren _did_ have a sense of humor. It was just so dry that most thought he was being serious.

"Let's do it," Pyrrha said suddenly.

"Okay. Wait. What?" Jaune asked.

"The aura class," Pyrrha said. "Let's do it."

"Ren? Nora?" Jaune asked.

Ren nodded.

Nora dissolved into giggles. "Huntress. Normal," she gasped out. Then raised a fist with a thumb extended upwards.

"Well…okay then."

"But there are conditions," Pyrrha said, pushing away from the window. She turned and pulled out of his arms. "You have to practice."

Jaune started to protest that he did.

" _And_ you have to let us _help_ you practice," Pyrrha said stubbornly.

"And Ren has to make pancakes!" Nora added.

"I can do that," Ren said, giving Jaune a challenging look.

"Then I suppose I can do that."

"Your physical conditioning is pretty good," Pyrrha said. She held up a hand before he could object, "that's a professional observation, Jaune. Your endurance is better than Ren's, and that's not just a matter of aura reserves."

"Thanks, I guess," Jaune said. "Working out was about all I could do openly so…"

"You have good tactical insights," Ren added.

"Ren means you came up with a plan to deal with that deathstalker during Initiation," Nora said.

"One that made maximum use of our talents and capabilities, and this despite having known us only a matter of hours," Pyrrha said. She stepped back and gave him a considering look. "We may need to find you some heavier armor and possibly a ranged weapon to supplement Crocea Mors, though."

"Uh, why?" Jaune asked. "You don't—"

Pyrrha shook her head. "I wear light armor so that I can use my semblance to move _me_ around. It grants me some protection, yes, but it's more important that it doesn't hinder me."

"Why?" Jaune asked. "Is it important, I mean."

"Semblance and aura aside, men are bigger than women, you have longer reach and better upper body-strength. Men, like you are Cardin, are big and strong enough to pack serious armor. The trade-off in mobility compensated by the ability to tank hits that are less draining on your aura," Pyrrha said. "In a tournament, that is actually advantageous for me."

"Because you can manipulate their armor and weapons," Jaune said.

"Exactly," Pyrrha said. "But most huntresses are either mobility fighters like Yang and Blake, or ranged fighters like Ruby and Weiss. Nora is strong enough to wear armor, but she's probably the only female in Beacon who is. Professors included."

"Well…yeah, but that's because of my semblance," Nora said.

"Then why aren't there more guys wearing armor?" Jaune asked.

"Probably a mix of Spruce Willis and me," Pyrrha said.

"That one you are going to need to explain," Nora said.

Pyrrha looked at the other girl on her team and chuckled. "Well…mobility fighters are flashy. Exciting to watch. They film well. _I_ might appreciate watching two tanks hammer each other, but most would probably find it incredibly dull. And where most people see people fighting with activated auras are in tournaments and in the movies. Occasionally there are videos of huntsmen and huntresses killing Grimm, but most of those are…set piece battles. Staged. There are no fatalities, and even injuries are rare in the extreme. The Kingdoms ruthlessly censor _true_ fights, at least as best they can."

"To prevent the spread of panic and fear," Jaune said.

"But it also means that a truly realistic appraisal is hard to find within the Kingdoms proper. That's why people who were raised outside the Kingdoms proper, or made frequent trips there, account for nearly four in five huntresses and huntsmen."

"That many?" Jaune asked.

"Nora and Ren came from a village in Anima outside Mistral, and you said your family often went camping outside…"

"Shion," Jaune said.

"Ruby and Yang were raised on Patch. Blake came from…somewhere outside the Kingdoms, though I don't think she's ever said where exactly. Only Weiss and I were raised inside the Kingdoms proper. That's right on seventy-five percent. Weiss has an older sister in Atlas' Specialist Corps who may have given her a realistic appraisal of what being a huntress is like.

"But to bring the conversation back to armor. The trend towards mobility fighters is probably driven mostly by popular culture, and it's not a good thing."

"Wait…it isn't?" Jaune asked.

"No," Pyrrha said firmly. "As I said, huntresses trend towards range and mobility fighters because we have to be. The downside of that is we also tend to die at higher rates."

"What?" Nora demanded. "I didn't know that. Ren?"

Ren shook his head.

"You have to dig into the casualty records and crunch the numbers yourself," Pyrrha said. "As far as I know, no Kingdom actually does it and has the percentages publicly available."

She crossed to her bed and sat on it, offering Nora a brittle smile. "It's the universe's cruel little joke. Every living thing has aura. But those of us with the strength, force of personality, or just plain _luck_ to be able to manifest an activated aura is a small fraction of the population. Those of us willing to also fight Grimm? The number is tiny. Too small to _not_ use half the population simply because we die at a higher rate. Actually, it's more than half. For some reason women are somewhat more likely than men to be able to manifest auras, even when you factor in that the ability to manifest an aura seems to run in families.

"It'd be interesting to look at more recent casualty rates. My guess is that with a trend towards mobility fighters, the casualty rates have also started to balance out."

After a while Pyrrha looked up at Jaune. "I'm more mobile than you because I have to be. I could never hope to be able to carry the amount of armor you'll be able to. Not and also be able to fight effectively for an appreciable amount of time. In the long run, assuming we both make it to graduation, that means I am almost certainly going to die before you do."

"That's grim," Ren said.

"And dark," Nora added. "Very dark."

"What she just said," Jaune added.

"It doesn't make it less truthful," Pyrrha said with a shrug. She stood again and appraised Jaune critically before shaking her head. "Almost all of my throws with Akoúo̱ have my semblance behind them. Nobody with normal strength could hope to impart enough velocity otherwise, and that doesn't begin to address trying to compute all the trajectories on the fly before _making_ a throw.

"It'd be a waste of time trying to teach you to fight like me. If we did, you'd be constantly struggling to attain a degree of flexibility that you'd probably never have, and it'd ignore the advantages of your superior upper body strength.

"If you can't dodge hits, that means you have to either preempt them or tank them. Armor, because the amount of aura you need to channel through equipment is miniscule compared to how much you need to weather an unprotected hit."

"Isn't that what the shield is for?" Jaune asked.

"A shield, even a non-thrown one, is as much weapon as defense," Pyrrha replied. She reached over and snatched the pillow off Ren's bed and held it up in her left hand. She twisted her body, widening her stance as her right foot drifted back. "You can't see where my right hand is," she demonstrated, using the pillow 'shield' to conceal much of her body as well as her right hand. "So my next attack could come from below," she drifted her right hand down, "or the right, or—" she pushed the shield at Jaune's face.

"Uh," he said, stumbling back despite Pyrrha checking the pillow-bash well shy of hitting him.

"You can also strike with the edges," Pyrrha continued. "Armor gives you additional options for deflecting, or taking, hits without being hurt."

* * *

"How bad is the damage?" Ironwood asked.

"Unknown."

"How many facilities were affected?"

"Unknown."

Ironwood considered the woman standing in front of his desk, her arms lightly clasped behind her back. "Okay, Winter. What exactly happened?"

"Unknown," she replied. Then, just as Ironwood was preparing to speak. "What is known has…unpleasant implications.

"There was some kind of electronic attack on the Schnee Dust Company's computer network. It caused no physical damage, which is why senior company officials initially refused to believe it was an attack. Exactly what it does it unclear, but it seems to 'infect' individual computers and renders them…ineffective…aside from infecting uncompromised computers networked to it."

"Infected?" Ironwood asked.

Winter tilted her head ever so slightly. "Someone inside the SDC referred to it as a 'plague.' The terminology seems to have stuck, though one of our computer people with a side-interest in medicine says it exhibits more viral behavior than bacterial."

"What is the scope?"

"Unknown," Winter replied. "Certainly, global headquarters is compromised. The Dust mine 'accident' that was reported is almost certainly a result. It may be that the mine is also being used to cover for other lost or compromised production facilities, but that is conjecture."

Ironwood stood. "Is there any sign it has spread beyond the SDC?"

"Negative. However," Winter added, "that is not to say that it hasn't. We cannot be certain how early an infection would be detected."

"Or that people would know what to look for."

"As you say, Sir."

"Do _we_ know what to look for?"

"A computer running without an obvious program," Winter said dryly. "There is one group that might have a better idea to both points, but I have been unable to locate them."

Ironwood blinked. "I thought Jacques had locked down the SDC on this?"

"He did…now," Winter said. "It was apparently first detected by a night watch technical specialist. He ordered the SDC networks taken down, all of them, on his own initiative. When Jacques found out he had the person in question, and everyone else in his department on that shift, fired."

"You're joking," Ironwood said flatly.

"Negative, Sir."

"Did you track them?"

"A luxury air-bus was hired to pick them up in front of the SDC headquarters building. It delivered them to aeroport-alpha where the entire team boarded a private charter to Vacuo where countermeasures were employed to throw off trackers. I have been unable to track them since."

"Corporate espionage?" Ironwood asked.

"Unlikely. The extraction was effective enough, but why call attention to your operation in such a way?" Winter asked. "It would make more sense to scatter you team and have them move interpedently. For that matter, why compromise an entire office? No, Sir. This was most likely a case of someone in Mistral or Vacuo noticing the SDC went dark in the middle of Atlas' night, correctly deduced that the team that was fired had something to do with it, and hired them on the fly."

"And Vale?"

"Likely a ruse. Vale's daylight cycle is similar to that of Atlas'."

Ironwood considered this before nodding. "Where does this put us with our open contracts with the SDC?"

"Our research projects are offline until we can insure security of their computer systems."

"Naturally."

"Production of the Paladin-series of combat mechs has been delayed. The prototype models are all we'll have for the foreseeable future."

Ironwood frowned before nodding again. "And Dust shipments?"

"Delayed."

"What?" Ironwood asked. "I thought our latest shipment was already warehoused pending shipment?"

"Father is auctioning his stockpiles among preexisting contract holders. Dust is being released on a priority basis to those willing to pay a premium on their shipment. Unless we are willing to pay, we will have to begin curtailing operational use within the next two weeks or begin tapping the strategic reserve."

"How big of a premium are we talking about?" Ironwood asked.

"Enough to put a rather significant hole in our budget." Winter pulled out her scroll, made a few quick taps, and handed it to him.

'Significant hole,' Ironwood thought, didn't begin to come close to the truth. "Project Denarius?" he asked, passing the scroll back.

"Project Denarius always anticipated a great deal of computer support at this juncture. The Doctor, however, has refused until we can firmly establish that the Project's computers are unaffected. The project continues without that support, but nobody, not even the Doctor, knows what type of impact that will have on the development of Denarius."

"Can we shut it down until we get that computer support?"

"Sir…" Winter visibly hesitated. "Sir, shutting down Denarius was always the most extreme of our contingency plans. We don't know that we'd get it back if we did. You know the Doctor won't be a party to it, would try to obstruct us if we tried unless there was a clear and compelling reason."

"Forget about Project Denarius for now, then," Ironwood said. "I'm overdue for a personal briefing with the Doctor anyway. And I will handle Jacques regarding our Dust shipment. I want you to see if you can track down this team he fired."

"And once I do?"

"Hire them for our own use. Offer them a civilian support contract if they won't enlist."

* * *

The Portico is one of the under-utilized places in Beacon. You can probably count the number of times you spent there on one hand with fingers left over.

With its double-high rows of columns and fountains, it's also one of the more beautiful. More peaceful.

That was probably one of Beacon's greater failings in retrospect. Everyone was so focused on becoming the best huntress or huntsman they could, that they never learned how to relax. To appreciate what was around them. To really _live_ …

You'd told Ozpin you wanted to limit the number of teams you'd offer classes to. What you hadn't told him was that you had fully intended to pitch the offer so that you'd only have to train RWBY and JNPR. He'd insisted you extend offers to four teams from each year. As it is, you managed to chase away eleven teams. In addition to RWBY and JNPR, CVFY stuck around, as did BLZE (another second-year team), and third-year team HRLKN.

This would have been hard enough with eight. You aren't sure that trying to teach twenty-one is even feasible, but since you don't really have a choice in the matter you figure you have one last shot to scare some of them off.

Most of them aren't doing too badly for the first time they've tried meditating. Some, like Ren and Yatsuhashi are doing quite well, actually.

Yang is…not. Go figure.

Your students—how weird is that?—disappear as the landscape ripples under your feet. The tiles are replaced with a sandy beach, as the columns merge and become a sand-stone cliff topped with a fringe of greenery, while others disappeared into brilliant blue sky. The sun shines, birds call, and waves wash against the shore.

A minute more and Jaune appears. Instead of his school uniform he wears the jeans and Pumpkin Pete hoody of his combat attire, but without the armor plates. A woman with bronze-colored skin and buttery hair lays on the beach behind him. Geometric tattoos the same color as her hair frame her right eye, tracing above her right eyebrow, along her cheekbone, and then down her cheek. A spaulder of silvery colored metal finished to a mirror shine protects her left shoulder, a vambrace adorns her right arm, a greave her left shin, and sandals lace up her calves. Otherwise the only clothing she wears is armor more decorative than protective—a sculpted plate across her breasts, and a bikini-bottom of scale-mail. A very familiar sword is belted at her left hip.

"Whoa, where are we?" Jaune asks, looking around. "Who is she? Where are the others?"

"The others aren't here yet," you reply. But that has more to do with you than them. You wave a hand and the woman disappears.

"Who is she? Wait, where did she go?"

"She is a long discussion that you and I need to have," you reply. He starts to speak, but you hold up a hand. "Later."

Much later, you do not add.

There's no real reason why you couldn't have it now, but despite what you said you don't _really_ want Jaune to fail. You think he probably won't have a choice with the pace you intend to push, but there's no sense in forcing the issue by overfilling his plate. If he does make it, all is well, and if not a side-project with a somewhat more leisurely pace would not be out of order.

But his…friend is also why you've guided him here first. Nobody else really needs to know about her. And giving most of them a mystery would do little except divert them from more important endeavors.

Ruby appears almost before you finish talking. That isn't particularly surprising given her other gifts, but finding her way to you without your help? That is, at least a little. Ruby wears her combat skirt and cloak, complete with Crescent Rose on its carrier, and belt with specialty rounds.

It figures that _she_ would see herself as…herself.

"Hey, Jaune," Ruby waves. "Where is everyone? Where are we?"

"We are nowhere," Ren—baggy pants and a long green tunic—says. Frown. "And everywhere."

 _Ooo_ -kay? Maybe this won't be quite so bad as you'd thought.

Blake, dressed in something better suited to Menagerie than Vale, stretched in a way no purely human spine could without breaking. "This is different," she comments.

"Blake, you have ears!" Ruby squeals.

"I _what_?" Blake's ears twitch. She freezes, then pats frantically for the bow that isn't there.

You helped Jaune, anticipated Ruby would find her way, and Ren was not terribly surprising. But you hadn't anticipated that _Blake_ would find her way on her own…and somehow that bow has managed to slip your mind.

A flick of power, the imposition of your will upon the universe, and Blake's hand freezes, and then searches frantically the top of her head and finds…nothing.

"I know I'm not always the most observant guy," Jaune says. "But weren't there cat ears there a moment ago?"

"There were," Ren agrees.

"And…I don't recall her having ears before?"

"I presume she was hiding them under the bow."

Blake crosses her arms. You aren't certain if the unimpressed look is for Jaune and Ren, or you.

"Blake's secret," you say. "No sharing…unless you want to know it's like to be a sloth."

"Er…no?" Jaune asks uncertainly.

You nod and turn to Blake. "But, Blake, I did warn you that there would be few secrets if you progress down this path."

"I thought you meant among my team," she said.

You shrug.

Her eyes narrow. "What did you do to my ears?" She looks around. "Where are we?"

"That is a fairly involved explanation," you reply. "One that will become apparent by the end of class." Pause. "Maybe."

Yatsuhashi appears, wearing a simple green kimono. He takes it all in, then sits down cross-legged on the sand. Sitting, he's almost as tall as you. He's just that big.

When no one else appears, you reach out. The other students are in close physical proximity to your body. It doesn't make pulling them into your fragment of reality easy, but it does make it straightforward.

Yang appears. She looks around. "Where are we?" she demands as Nora appears next to her. "Ooh. Field trip!" She hops up and begins wandering around.

A rather confused-looking Weiss appears a split moment before Pyrrha. Then the other members of CFVY in rapid succession, followed by those of BLZE and HRLKN. Most are wearing clothes with the same general color patterns as their combat attire, but almost always civilian in nature. The only one who is wearing their usual attire in its entirety is Ruby, and the only other one who comes close it Jaune.

"Since several of you have asked, physically we are still at Beacon, sitting in the Portico," you say.

"You mean this isn't real?" Jaune asks.

"What is real?" You ask philosophically. "Define reality."

"Um…"

"Okay, what is the _nature_ of reality?"

"Hey look!" Nora calls. "I can walk on water!" She hops a breaking wave, skips a little further out, then stood, daring a wave to break around her legs. Instead a wall of solid 'water' hit her ankles, spilling her onto her back. The wave following it slaps into her body and pushes her back to the beach before dropping her on the 'sand'. "Oof," she says as she sprawls out in front of you, "the water's hard."

"I don't feel any heat from the sun," Blake notes.

Ruby kneels. "And this sand is all one piece. It _feels_ like sand when you're walking on it. And it _looks_ like sand, but the texture is wrong and you can't pick any up."

"Good." And it is. Better than good, actually. Better than you managed your first time. "As you are discovering, the reality of this place is little more than skin deep. It engages your visual senses, and you can physically interact with it only in the most basic sense, but it goes no deeper."

"Is that important?" Weiss asks. "Where _are we_?"

"When I asked Jaune to define the nature of reality, I was not being philosophical," you sit. "All of you, sit down, please. I think this is going to be…fairly involved."

"This is a shared hallucination, isn't it?" Weiss asks.

"Shared, certainly," Velvet says in her heavily accented alto. "But we can interact with it on a physical level. Even if we cannot interact with it in the way of real—normal?—sand or water. That makes it far more than a hallucination."

"Several of you have asked where we are. The correct answer to that question is: the Portico at Beacon," you say. "That is our physical location. This place, where our collective consciousnesses now reside, is a place of the mind. My mind, actually."

"We're in your mind?" Yang yelps.

"No…and yes."

"Professor," Pyrrha begins, but you wave a hand.

"I'm not being obtuse. Not intentionally. I can teach you how to access parts of yourselves that the majority of even the most accomplished huntsmen and huntresses will never see. It is rather essential, actually. This…endeavor we are embarking on is very much a voyage of self-discovery, and success will depend greatly upon your individual efforts give that understanding meaning and context.

"What we don't have, however, is twenty or thirty years for you to examine navel lint while reciting koans. So, we're going to cheat a little. This is one of those. It is, essentially a mental construct that I have devised and am maintaining. It is not, as Yang put it, in my mind. But my mind _is_ what gives it form."

"But-but the mind doesn't work that way!"

You'd been wondering who would have the hardest time accepting the rather drastic change to reality. In retrospect, you shouldn't be surprised it's Weiss.

"What evidence do you have to support this?" you ask.

"Everyone knows—"

"I don't care what 'everyone' knows," you cut her off. "I care about what _you_ know. So, Weiss, what evidence do you have that this isn't a construct of my mind?"

"The world doesn't work that way," Weiss says stubbornly.

"Okay, what evidence would you have beyond that of your senses that this is real?"

"You yourself said that this isn't real."

"Just because it isn't a place in the physical world doesn't mean it isn't real."

"This isn't aura manipulation." You look over at Yatsuhashi. "Just what are you teaching us…Professor?"

"Well done," you murmur. You actually expected the question to come from Ren. But despite his training, it made sense really. He and Nora were never open about how they'd managed to stick together after they were orphaned. It couldn't have been easy, and that probably put limits on just how much time Ren could have put into studying non-combat-oriented arts. "That is well done indeed."

Yatsuhashi bows slightly.

"You are correct, of course. This is not aura manipulation. Not in the context that you understand it, at least. However, you lack the context for me to simply tell you what it is I plan to teach. So instead let me ask this: what is aura?"

"Aura is the outward manifestation of our soul," Pyrrha says instantly. "Every living thing has an aura. It's what sets us apart from the Grimm."

"Textbook answer," you acknowledge. "And what sets a huntsman's or huntress' aura apart from a civilian's?"

"Huntsmen have activated auras," Jaune says.

"Ah-hem," Nora says.

"Uh…and so do huntresses," he adds quickly.

"And what is an activated aura?"

"An activated aura is protection," Kelly Phillips speaks up. Thus far both of the upper-year teams have been content to let the younger students take lead and debate matters. You'd been wondering how long that would last. "It shields us from harm, heals our injuries, it allows us to run faster, jump higher…"

"All perfectly true," you agree. "But that is what an activated aura _does_ , not what it _is_."

The question is something of a trap. Pyrrha's response was textbook, but the books don't define the difference between an aura and an activated aura. They _describe_ the differences, some in great detail, but they don't actually define it.

"Can't we define something by what it does?" Pyrrha asks then.

"No," you reply. "You can, however, describe something that way. But let me ask another question and see if that helps. What sets a huntress' or huntsman's aura apart from someone else with an unlocked aura?"

"Only someone capable of being a huntress of huntsman is capable of having their aura activated," Weiss replies instantly.

" _Wrong_ ," Yang says.

"No, I'm not."

"You, uh, kind of are," Ruby says. "Sorry."

"Are you sure?" Pyrrha asks. "It was my understanding that those strong enough to manifest the aura required to be a huntress or huntsman were a small fraction of the population."

"They are," you reply. "But nevertheless, Yang and Ruby are both correct. Those lacking the strength of aura to be a huntresses or huntsmen can still have their auras unlocked."

"But then why doesn't everyone have theirs activated?" Blaise asks.

"Yeah?" Jaune asks. "I mean, with the advantages, it'd make sense for everyone to have it done, but that isn't the case."

"I suppose there are three reasons," you reply. "First, there are some people who are genuinely incapable of having their aura unlocked. They aren't exactly uncommon, but they are in the minority.

"Second, as you may recall, having your aura unlocked in a fairly intimate experience. Furthermore, not everyone with an unlocked aura is capable of unlocking another's. The specific qualities and training needed are uncommon, and given the connection formed by unlocking, those who can are naturally adverse to the idea of going out and unlocking auras wholesale." You glace at Pyrrha who is intently examining the ground.

"The third," you say after a moment, "and perhaps most germane reason, is that Grimm have been proven to be able to sense or detect someone with an unlocked aura at many times the range of a person without. In fact, given a choice, most Grimm seem to prefer a victim with an activated aura, even to the point of ignoring much easier prey.

"This is why, during the Great War, the number of soldiers with unlocked auras fielded by all sides was a very tiny percentage compared to the overall size of the armies. Despite the advantages, battlefields draw enough Grimm on their own that fielding entire armies—if it was even practical, which it wasn't—of individuals whose very nature attracts them was…less than desirable.

"That said, there are civilians with activated auras. Some of these are retired or medically invalided huntsmen and huntresses. People who began training at one of the combat schools, but who later decided that a career as a huntsman or huntress didn't appeal, make up a fair number as well. And those employed in certain high-risk or emergency-service fields where the benefits are high enough to justify the risk will often have their auras unlocked as a matter of course. In any case, their numbers, both in total and relative to the population, is carefully managed and deliberately kept lower than anyone particularly likes.

"Back to the question at hand. Does anyone have another definition or thought to offer?"

"Maybe…" Natalie Brunswick breaks off with a troubled look.

"Go on."

"Well…maybe they don't have an aura," she says. "Those who we say their aura isn't activated. I mean, they still have _souls_ , but activation…brings out an aura?"

"That's ridiculous," Weiss scoffs.

"Why?" you ask, holding up a hand as Hunter starts to come to his teammate's defense.

"Well… Everyone knows that everyone has an aura."

"How?" you challenge. "Why?"

Weiss glowers at you. "Everything living has a soul. Ergo, everything living has an aura."

"Very good." You smirk. "Why?"

Weiss huffs and crosses her arms. "Does it matter?"

"Now _that_ is a good question," you nod. "And the answer is both yes and no. No, it doesn't matter to us from a practical standpoint. Yes, it matters because it impedes our ability to define what, exactly, we are talking about.

"Here's another question. What is the difference between the soul and aura?"

You sit back and watch as debate erupts in earnest. Even BLZE and HRLKN get in on the act. Most agree that they are two separate things. Well, to be fair, that's the commonly held belief. But their relationship, how one goes from one to the other, was firmly up in the air.

"Okay, teach, what's the answer?" Yang asks suddenly.

"The answer is that there are no fast answers," you reply. "We are discussing matters of metaphysics and philosophy. I could tell you _my_ answers of course, but that does not mean that you will have understanding for your own use.

"Still…" you grin at Yang's impatient sound. "Have any of you heard the term _Xi_?"

"The word _Xi_ is a very old Mistralian term that means a person's essence that resides in their body," Yatsuhashi said.

That was interesting. You hadn't thought _anyone_ would recognize it.

"Did you actually study it?" you ask carefully.

But Yatsuhashi shakes his head. "It was something my teacher mentioned briefly in passing. A way of using aura before it was discovered how to activate auras. He said it took decades of study."

"It does…normally," you reply. "We're going to cheat."

"Why?" Yang asks. "I mean…what's the point?"

"Another good question. I'm going to make some corrections to Yatsuhashi's definition and then let's see if anyone can answer your question." You smile. "The definition that Yatsohashi gave is actually for, well…actually, it doesn't matter. Let's call it 'the soul' and move on. They have another term that for all practical purposes means 'aura.'"

"Great. They had the same philosophical conversations we have," Weiss intones.

"The thing is, _neither_ of those two terms are _Xi_. Yet _Xi_ is clearly related. How?"

For a while they all frown, or trade looks. BLZE restarts the conversation on differences between soul and aura in hushed tones that involve a lot of hand-waving.

"Is it some kind of transference mechanism?" Velvet asks softly.

Conversation stops dead.

"Yes, Velvet," you say. "That's it exactly. A transference mechanism between the soul and aura, irrespective of whether the latter is unlocked or not."

"Is anyone else confused yet?" Jaune asked, raising a hand. Most of the others followed.

You grin. "Well, there's a reason why just about the only ones who are fluent in High Mistrali anymore are academics. But it's also a reason why High Mistrali gives all of these terms distinct words."

"Really?" Jaune is looking at Pyrrha who sheepishly lowers her hand.

"Yes. Even most high-class Mistralians don't speak the old tongue anymore. Oh, many learn rote phrases, but that's different."

"How?"

"I'm sorry," Pyrrha says.

"It's ok—okay," Jaune says with a grin of his own, "point taken."

You clear your throat. "From observation we know that both aura and unlocked aura exist."

"Accepted," Weiss agrees.

"And that aura, regardless of state, is the outward manifestation of an energy-source that exists with anything living."

"Uh…what about Grimm?"

Everyone looks at Jaune.

"They aren't alive," Blaise says.

"But—"

"Blaise is right," Hunter agrees. "They don't breathe. They eat us, humans and faunus, but they don't need to. They don't breed."

"Some other energy absorption?" Jaune suggests.

"They've been locked in lightless, airless vaults for years with no discernable effect," Kelly sighs. "There are some wild theories that they live on neutrinos, or background radiation or something, but as far as I know any attempt to prove them alive has come up with nothing. I mean, they don't even leave bodies. Even their ichor vanishes. Their internal structure has no bones or viscera or discernable organs…"

"Setting aside the problem of Grimm for the moment," you interject. "Energy-source inherent in any living thing?"

"Also accepted," Weiss agrees.

You want for someone to object but no one does. "So what does it mean that the soul powers both aura and unlocked aura?"

"An activated aura once depleted no longer provides benefit," Pyrrha says. "You cannot make use of semblance, it will not shield you from harm, it will not make you jump higher or farther. Since aura therapy is a regular supplementary medical practice—to the point where transfers are taught as basic field emergency medicine—it stands to reason that it is both possible to disrupt _Xi_ , and that it is unhealthy for you to do so."

Ruby is almost as quick to respond. "There's some principal in weapon design for, uh, energy weapons, that the further power needs to travel between the emitter matrix and point of impact, the more energy is lost in the transfer. And the same for the distance between power source and emitter matrix. So a…an activated aura is less efficient than…Xi? because it's putting in another step that the, um, the soul-energy, _Xi_ , needs to travel through before it can do…stuff?"

Damn they're fast. You can't help but applaud, but softly.

"But," Ruby goes on. "If you tried to cut the emitter matrix out of the energy weapon, it wouldn't fire so—I was going somewhere with this. I know I was."

"You were," you agree. "But analogy is always suspect. If you and another hold a common understanding, it can certainly be used to describe something else. But there is a limit to how closely one thing can look like another."

"Oh," Rub says.

"Well done, Ruby, Pyrrha. Both of you.

"Using an unlocked aura is inherently safe. No matter how hard you try, you cannot exceed the limit of what it can safely do…though you may find yourself dying because of those limits."

"How does that work?" Yang said.

"An unlocked aura allows you to run faster than those without," you observe.

She nods.

"But you cannot run so fast that doing so physically harms you," you continue. "If you run off a cliff and die from the sudden deceleration at the bottom, that's on you, not on your aura doing something physically harmful to you.

"The flipside is… You've all heard the stories about little old ladies with only a standard aura lifting a car to get it off her grandkid? Or one guy holding up a brace in a collapsing mine long enough for everyone else to get out?" Most of them nod. "Well, in certain high-stress circumstances, with enough adrenaline and endorphins, it is possible for the human body to exceed its designed operational margins. Doing so is usually extremely unhealthy. Bone damage; joint damage; tears to muscles, tendons, and ligaments… Start somewhere around 'crippling' and work down from there.

"Now, an unlocked aura will allow you to exceed that performance by a wide margin. By most measures, it is pointless to even try comparing them. But the flipside is that all-or-nothing do-or-die burst of performance that is the difference between your friends living or dying horribly, is beyond you. Simply put, an unlocked aura will literally not allow you to destroy yourself."

"You aren't just going to show us a new aura technique," Jaune inetjects. "No matter how versatile or dangerous. You've been cutting down the number of students you have to teach, without actually teaching us anything. And we've spent a lot of time today arguing over semantics that…" his voice trails off, "aren't just purely semantics, are they?" he asks.

"No," you agree. "They aren't purely semantics. A bone-deep understanding of the nuances is vital if any of you want to learn these…techniques safely. By which I mean, not to put too fine a point on it, safe _for you_.

"And yes, Jaune," you continue. "I have been deliberately whittling down my class size to something that I can safely—again, safe for you—oversee."

"Why?" Hunter asks. "What makes these techniques so dangerous to us? For that matter, why should we use them?"

"That isn't an easy question to answer," you reply. "To answer your first question, however, there are two parts. First, everyone is different, and so approaches the techniques in a unique manner. They might be similar, but only very rarely the same.

"Second, aura acts as both a regulator valve, and a filter that _shapes_ your aura to accomplish specific tasks. Going back to what I just discussed, it won't let you draw more than you can safely handle. What I propose to teach you essentially chops that regulator off. If you draw more power than you can safely handle, you die. If you don't shape that power correctly, you die. If you don't shape that power in the way you need at any given moment, you die. If you use too _much_ power, it doesn't simply stop working the way aura depletion does, you die. If you manage to do all those things correctly but fail to judge your own abilities correctly, you could easily kill your sparring partner, or have nothing left for the next threat you face. And I can only guide you safely so far. After a certain point you have to learn on your own. Make one mistake, and you die. Considering what some of you can do with your aura or semblance, you may well not be dying alone."

You let that hang there like the proverbial sword of doom. Some of them, you can tell, hadn't really accepted just how potentially dangerous to themselves what you were proposing to teach them.

"As to why you _may_ want to learn them," you continue in a softer voice. "Your…affinity with your aura will only ever continue to increase. Skill, versatility, how much damage it can tank or damage it can inflict, speed, how high you can jump, endurance… All of these will continue to increase with age, experience, and use. Even if you trained the rest of your life, it is exceedingly likely that you would die of old age before reaching your maximum performance.

"These techniques…bypass that. You'll have access to all that power, as soon as you learn how to channel it safely."

"That's a heck of a benefit," Hunter said.

"I know it can sound like one," you say. "But there are two more points you need to consider. First, this will invalidate everything you have learned about channeling, using, or otherwise manipulating your aura. You will have to start again at the very beginning, and Beacon will not wait for you to catch up.

"The second is that we are quickly approaching the point of no return. Meditation and framing techniques are all well and good. But once you start actually learning to harness _Xi_ , you will lose the regulatory function of your aura and there is no way that I know of to get it back. That first step is a lifetime commitment, and if you realize it is too much before you kill yourself with it, your career will be over before it ever began."


	10. Volume 1, Chapter 8: Gear

**Disclaimer: In which the Author makes no claims to ownership.**

* * *

"Having the right gear won't make your mission a success, but having the wrong gear will doom it faster than you can say 'Grimm.'"

Ruby frowned as her sister snickered. "Blake."

A moment later Yang huffed and fell silent.

Elbow, Ruby decided, probably.

"Each of you has a yearly equipment allowance that you can use to acquire personal gear through Beacon at cost."

Professor Pullman was tall, and old. His hair was shaved short, the color of gristle; and a trio of prominent claw scars started on the back of his head, wrapped around the left side—barely missing the ear—and then cut down across his face barely stopping short of his mouth. A black patch covered where his left eye was.

"Not that it'll do you much good."

"Why not?" Ruby asked.

"Remnant's a big place. Even the limited parts we live on are huge," he replied. "Everything from ice-flows on Solitas, to swamps and jungles of Anima, to the deserts of western Sanus. Mountains south of Vale. Oceans, lava fields… Huntsmen and huntresses are free to find their niche, but one of the reasons they are encouraged to find _a_ niche rather than do everything is the sheer amount of specialized gear needed to operate at peak efficiency in any given environment.

"Your trainee licenses will also allow you to purchase personal gear at hunter supply businesses. They generally have examples of current military gear from all of the Kingdoms, plus equipment offered on civilian markets at prices that are generally better than civilian stores. You will need to graduate and obtain full licenses before you can purchase hunter-spec vehicles, heavy weapons, and the like, and even then, most heavy gear will be outside of your immediate price-range."

"Do you have a personal gear list that you recommend for, uh, as broad an environment as possible?" Ruby asked.

"Why, as it just so happens I do," Pullman grinned which twisted his scars in highly unsettling ways.

Ruby had her scroll out before it even beeped, a few rose petals drifting to the floor. The equipment list was…not short. She taped one of the recommended Equipment Carriers, Personal, and found a list of packs, frames, harness, belts, pouches, equipment carriers, cinches, straps, inserts, and repair kits that ran for over three pages.

Oh, wait. It was _modular_. She could take the parts and literally design her own pack! Ruby scrolled back to the top of the parts list. Let's see, she'd need a frame, and a pack, straps, belt, chest cinch, ooh, a hydration bladder sounded good and that meant she'd better get the water purification kit as well, a repair kit just in case, and a maintenance pou—oooh, there was a sock-sheath intend for a shotgun that'd be just about perfect for a spare barrel for Crescent Rose—and a detachable assault pack would be a good idea, extra ammunition pouches—a medical pouch? better get two—and a pouch for grenades because she might be working with Nora, and there even was a carrier with armored sleeves for vials of Dust!

"Now," Professor Pullman jerked Ruby's attention away from her scroll, "I know better than to suggest that huntresses who have less than two weeks at this fine institution might have made…less than optimal field-wear choices," Pullman said. "That said, one of you is already wearing one of the finest boots there are. Ruby Rose, please come up and tell us about your footwear."

Ruby slowly walked up to the table and sat on it, lightly kicking her legs. "So, the, um, Modular Battle Boot was designed by a partnership of Mistral and Atlas. It comes in black, brown, or gray, and your choice of ten trim colors—"

"Always important," Professor Pullman said dryly.

"And, er, well…it's modular!" Ruby added. "So if you've stripped the paint off your weapon, but only have a gray primer on it and you need to deal with a sudden Grimm attack, you can pull off the red trim and put on the gray to keep everything neatly accessorized!"

Pullman's frown was even more terrifying than his smile. "You accessorize your appearance to your weapon?"

"Of course!" Ruby chirped. She looked at the others in the class, then, slowly, back to Pullman. "Doesn't," she hesitated, "um, doesn't everybody?"

Pullman's face twisted into that horrific smile again. "By swapping around inserts and parts it'll keep feet dry and warm from temperatures of negative thirty up to fifty degrees. And they're configurations for different environments: deserts, jungles, swamps, glaciers…

"There are also a host of accessories that are fully compatible with the MBB," Pullman continued as Ruby hopped off the table. "Including everything from cleats and crampons for added traction, to snowshoes, to spats and gaiters for added foot- and leg-armor.

"We'll come back to other footwear. Let's start with sleep systems," Pullman said as he dropped three compression sacks on top of the table.

"The HT-MSS-37 modII," he said, unsnapping the first. He flipped something, there was a soft hiss, and it spread out into a box about two meters long and a bit more than a meter high and wide. "The best there is with a price-tag to match. Developed for the Vale Army and skipped over for something a little bulkier, a little heavier, a little less versatile, and half the cost.

"The outer layer in an inflatable one-person shelter. You can stake it down and use it as a tent, or string it from trees and use it as a hammock, or even anchor it to a cliff-face and sleep hanging off the side of a mountain. It's fully ventilated, with integrated insect-screens, and the sides have break-away fasteners in case you need to get out in a hurry; take note, this is not a good idea if you're up a cliff face or in a tree. The base has an integrated insulation mat. And the whole doubles as a compression bag. Inside the shelter are nested sleeping bags, just pick the right layer for the local environment. They can be used individually separate from the outer shelter, if you want, though mind the environmental factors. As a combination system, it is rated down to negative thirty. There is a small, integrated Dust reactor that can be removed to save weight. With burn or ice Dust, the habitable environmental profile reaches out to any practical environment.

"Note the _practical_ environment. If you try to go to sleep inside an active volcano as at least one person with more lien than sense tried to do, you _will_ die and it won't matter how much ice Dust you load…"

Okay, it wasn't as exciting as weapons, but this was pretty neat too.

"…also doubles as a litter for casualty evacuations and a body bag." Pullman grinned horrifically again. "The latter isn't its most common use, but it's close.

"Now, moving on to the bag Vale went with in its place…"

* * *

"How are the new hires fitting in?" you ask.

"Which ones?" Flattery asks dryly.

"Presumably the ones we hired after the SDC fired them." I'm 'Amy Chiaroscuro' at the moment, so I'm tied in via a three-way video conference rather than directly interfacing with your implants.

"Well enough, I suppose," Flattery acknowledges. "It helps that their shift-leader was essentially free to do his own recruiting. Their qualifications were being seriously miss-utilized by the SDC. I'm not sure that we can make effective use of two or three of them, not yet anyway. On the other hand, Oscar says Rosetta is excellent at conceptualizing attack strategies even if she doesn't have the technical skills to make them reality."

"You aren't actually designing…what are you calling them?"

"Plagues," Flattery said. "Oscar says they actually behave more like viruses, or at least the one that attacked the SDC did, but the term 'plague' seems to have stuck."

"Lovely," you remark. "And I notice you didn't answer my _first_ question."

"We are. Only on standalone systems," she added quickly. "But Oscar convinced me that we need to understand what it is we're trying to prevent, or treat, so…"

"Lovely," you sigh. "Alright, just…keep them from getting out."

"That we can do," Flattery agreed. "Actually, the more I'm finding out, the more disturbing I find the whole thing."

"How so?" you ask.

"How much do you know about, well, computer infrastructure?" I ask. We are both occasionally finding the need to work around the fact that we're the only ones who know we're stage-managing our reinvention of the future more than a little surreal.

You shrug.

"Well, we're calling it the candy shell," I continue. "If you try to get into a system, the security is actually pretty robust. Actually, the shell is hard enough that unless you have access, it's almost impossible."

"Almost?" you repeat for Flattery's benefit.

"Only almost," I smile. "That's enough to stop, well, almost everyone. But once you get past that shell, the inside is pretty gooey."

"Uh-huh," you say. "It strikes me that there's still a lot of stuff happening _between_ computers."

"Yeah, well, that's mostly the CCTs," I reply.

"The CCTs themselves are very nearly impervious from outside attack," Flattery said. "I don't claim to understand the details, but all of our staff agree. At the same time, the whole system is very fragile. If one goes down, we lose planetwide communications."

"What about that 'almost?'" you ask.

"The high-level threats," I reply. "Those _could_ be a problem, but pretty much aren't…because they understand enough not to be a problem."

"What Amy means is, while there are those who are perfectly capable of getting past the candy shell, nobody, or nearly nobody, tries. As much as could be gained by taking down one company or the like, nobody wants to risk the CCTs. Taking out world-wide communications has the potential to bring more trouble, entire Kingdoms, not just huntsmen and huntresses, than it's worth. Apparently, this concern is why a number of…call them attacks, have not happened. In several cases they were preempted when someone tipped off local authorities before a plague could be released."

"Okay. What about developing that redundancy?"

Flattery nods and picked up a scroll and considers it briefly. "Gerald acquired an artillery system Atlas developed for its air dreadnoughts. It was produced just after they went to the all-energy cannons for their primary weapon systems, and so was never used. We've, well, put two barrels together to lengthen in—it's a bit more complicated than that, but you get the general idea—and set up a test facility on an island west of Anima.

"That's the good news.

"The bad news is that even if the tests go well, we're looking at ten years, minimum, to develop something commercially viable, and it's probably going to be twice that. We just…keep finding more problems and too damn few solutions."

"Such as?"

"How to aim it, for one," Flattery said. "We need multiple satellites in multiple orbits. If we can't move or aim the gun, that means the satellite needs to be able of producing a great deal of…delta-V, or we risk being able to only put satellites into a very narrow band."

"Options?"

"Expensive, and more expensive," Flattery replied. "We can either create a large number of immobile guns or…one of the solutions put forward has a barrel that is more than four kilometers long, and almost wholly immersed in the ocean. It'd be suspended from the surface by large floats. By adjusting the position of the floats and length of tethers, we'd be able to adjust the point of aim of the gun."

"Ouch," you say.

"But it's worse than that. Maintaining global communications is a not-minor part of your plan. Without satellites, that puts us back on trying to keep the CCTs up, and they are just too vulnerable. You can only be at one place at a time, and they only need to be successful once.

"We may, however, have an interim solution."

"You do?" you ask, while at the same time asking ' _Amy?_ '

' _Wait until you hear this_ ,' I reply _. 'You'll like it. Gerald will flip a nut though.'_

"It wouldn't be as efficient as satellites. They'd wear out faster, needing more frequent—likely much more frequent—replacement. And while satellite systems would be sufficiently distant to be protected from nearly any physical threats, this would only be sufficiently protected from _most_ physical threats. Individual nodes would and likely far more vulnerable, but the cost should be sufficiently low that we could deploy a great many more of them…maybe."

"Detectability? Cost?"

"As long as we keep the comm net restricted, the detection values should be fairly low. It'd be visible to anyone looking in the right place, but unless someone happened upon one by accident no one should have a reason to look…at first. Once they start broadcasting to everyone on the planet, they'll be quite obvious. And once people start actively looking, finding them will be straightforward if probably not particularly easy. At first. Cost is…more than I can quantify at this time. Certainly less on a per-unit basis than a satellite, even without launching costs.

* * *

"We should attack the SDC now, while it's weak."

"Adam…don't you trust me?"

"No."

Cinder laughed. "How remarkably…honest." Her chuckle died abruptly. "Right now, the Schnee Dust Company and the Atlas Military need one another. Attack one, and the other will leap to its defense. However weak the SDC is, the White Fang does not have the resources to attack the Atlesian Military."

"We have more resources than you think."

"Not in Atlas," Cinder said flatly.

"And if we do it your way?"

"If we do it my why the SDC and the Atlasian Military will destroy one another. Besides, you are thinking too small. This opens to us all _sorts_ of future opportunities…"

* * *

"…forty minutes…thirty meters…" Yang frowned at the colorful square of plastic, then down at the worksheet laying half-complete on the open book on her bed. "Forty minutes…thirty meters…" she followed the lines from each of the numbers to a box where they converged. The box was split in two and she glared at the red number on top before underlining the number below with a thumbnail and scratching it down on the worksheet.

"Y'know, Rubes," she said, looking over the edge of her bunk at where Ruby was sitting at a desk with her own plastic square, "when you first told us about these weekend classes, I thought we were going to be doing something _fun_."

"This is."

"No. This is _math_."

"Math today, fun tomorrow." Ruby flipped her plastic square around. "Back me up, Weiss."

"Why should I?"

"You _like_ homework."

"Do you have any idea what saltwater will do to my hair?"

"Ruby?" Yang asked. "Is there something you forgot to tell me?"

Ruby snagged a cookie from a plate on the desk. "You go swimming all the time back home."

"So?"

"What do you think the water around Patch is, Yang?" Ruby asked patiently. "Don't worry about the water, Weiss. Yang is kind of obsessed about her hair. You can just use her stuff."

"How can you snack like that?" Weiss asked.

"She's still growing," Yang said.

" _I'm_ still growing. We are _all_ still growing, Yang."

"Point," Yang agreed. "But Ruby's semblance burns energy like no one's business, and it pulls from her body's reserves, not just her aura. No idea what it'll do now."

"Still hungry," Ruby muttered.

"But, Rubes. You have us sacrificing a weekend to do math? Why do we even need to know this?"

"Have you looked at chapter seven?"

Yang gripped her mattress as she stuck her head over to look at her partner who was sitting underneath and reading a book. "Unlike you, I don't make it a habit to memorize the entire book before the first class."

Ruby scratched down one more answer and turned to her partner who had a history textbook open. "Trade?"

Weiss waved off-handedly at her copy of the same worksheet as Ruby had just completed.

"Seriously, Ruby. What's the worst that could happen?"

Ruby looked up at where her sister was now sprawled on her bunk. Instead of replying she pulled out her scroll. The overhead lights dimmed, and the room's holo-display lit up.

The video was old, in color, but the colors were distorted, and the image was grainy. It was the kind of thing common to the Great War. Ruby walked back to her partner as men clustered around a figure in a canvas suit and heavy dive helmet laying sprawled on the deck of a boat.

"What are you doing you dolt?" Weiss complained as Ruby put a hand in front of Weiss' face. She glanced at Blake who was pointedly reading a novel, then squeezed her own eyes shut and stuck another cookie in her mouth.

" _Gaah_."

Peanut butter, Ruby thought, trying _not_ to think about the gush of red fluid, too thick to be just blood, pouring out of the vision port as the people in the video unscrewed it.

"W-what was _that_?" Yang asked.

Ruby opened her eyes again and quickly shut down the holoscreen.

"Double mechanical failure. A poorly maintained non-return valve was stuck open, and the surface-supplied air failed, resulting in a pressure differential of more than ten atmospheres between the inside and outside of the suit."

Weiss looked at Blake. "Do I want to know how you know that?"

"I looked up what the worst was that could happen," Blake replied without looking up from her book. "Turns out it is getting your organs shoved into your helmet, and your blood sucked up ten meters of air-line."

"Figures," Weiss snorted. "I suppose I should be grateful Ruby stuck her hand in my face."

"Probably," Blake agreed without looking up from her book as she turned a page.

"Yes." Yang's voice was flat, but she swallowed heavily. "And you want to do something where _that_ can happen?"

"We aren't talking about hard-hat diving," Blake said. "And we'll be at much shallower depths."

"But—"

"It's graphic," Ruby said. "You can _see_ the result. But if you'd reach chapter seven you'd know that there are an awful lot of ways you could be hurt, even killed, if you do something wrong. So…do the math. And then you trade with Blake to make sure you've each done it correctly."

"I still don't understand why you thought to sign us up for this course," Weiss commented. "Your answers are good, by the way."

"I didn't think it was something any of us had done, and it looked like it would be fun."

"Not really practical, though," Yang said.

"There are a lot of sea-based Grimm. Having an introduction to how to be safe in the environment is a good idea," Ruby disagreed. Bagging a kraken would be _major_ kudos for a team of huntresses-in-training, not that she had _any_ intention of trying to take one in their own environment, that was what Dust-launched harpoons and explosives dropped from a boat were fo—ooh, maybe they could put hamsters or something in a pressure vessel, wrap the explosives around it, and then wrap meat around _that…_ that way the kraken would sense both meat _and_ aura and when it ate—

She shook her head, making a note to save the thought for later as she went back to the topic at hand. "Speaking of, we're swapping partners for the pool this weekend. I'll partner with Yang. Blake, you'll be with Weiss."

There were the expected groans from Yang and put-upon look from Weiss, but otherwise they seemed to go along with it. Good. It was only a matter of time before Blake's previous loyalties came to light. The more Weiss trusted her with her life, the better, since it was pretty clear that it'd only come out in the most dramatic way possible instead of a calm, reasoned discussion. Why did people have to be so hard? Why couldn't they be more like weapons?

* * *

"W-we're inside your mind?" Jaune yelped.

You nod and hum an affirmative.

This only seems to make his near-panic worse.

"You didn't think you'd fallen asleep in my office, and we just happened to be sharing the same lucid dream of us walking along a Vacuo beachfront at midnight…did you?"

"Well, I, uhhh…no?"

"Why don't you ask me what's really on your mind."

"I'm not…I didn't screw up, did I?"

"Not any more than you already have."

"Then why the 'request' for an office visit?" he asks with very little hesitation.

You're glad to see it. Now if he could only show it a bit more often.

"All of my students are receiving one-on-one instruction for this next part."

"What? Why?"

"In part…that," you nod towards the sand behind him.

Jaune turns, then yelps and jumps back as he nearly stumbled upon the sleeping woman from the first time you'd met here.

"Oh, uh…yeah?" he asks with a nervous chuckle. "Who, uh…who is she?"

"Now _that_ is a very good question," you murmur. "She's real. Real in the same way you or I are real, and a Grimm is not. But she is also not-real in the way you and I, and Grimm, are. Her being here is closely related to your own."

"Um… I never seen her before in my life?"

"Is that question, or a statement?"

"Oh, uh, statement. Definitely statement. Definitely haven't seen her."

"Nor had I expected you to," you admit. You may not know who the woman is, but then, you don't really have to in order to know _what_ she is. And here you thought you'd known everything there was to know about Jaune Arc. Well, _this_ certainly explained a few things.

The number of things she could be is vanishingly small.

"When, or if, she wakes, you will find her a far more capable teacher in this than I am."

If she's here and not awake yet…well, there is one sure-fire way to wake her up before everything goes tits-up. Mountain Glen would be just about perfect, wouldn't it? With a little time and effort on your part, but it'd also be worthwhile to consider if there was an earlier opportunity.

"Okay, uh, so how do I wake her?"

"You don't," you reply. "It must be her choice. Forcing the issue would be…bad."

Very bad.

But he doesn't need to know that.

The beach you had been using fades away into nothingness until you and Jaune are standing in emptiness. You aren't floating, but neither are you standing on anything. There is no up down, or even depth. It is also neither black, nor white. There is neither light nor darkness, but you can both see each other perfectly.

"W-w-where are we?"

There _is_ sound.

"We're in your mind."

Jaune looks around. "I, uh, don't suppose you could be wrong? I mean, I hoped my mind wasn't so…empty."

"Hardly," you scoff. You wave his next comment into silence before he can voice it. "Okay. This is, well, they are all hard lessons, but until you are able to do this next piece there is really no reason for us to try moving forward, either with these lessons, or your training at Beacon."

"That's not ominous at all."

"A vague disclaimer is no one's friend," you reply mildly. "This is the moment of decision, from which you cannot go back. What you need to do is build an interface to replace the regulatory function of your aura."

"A what?"

* * *

"A mental construct. Something that can engage your senses and that you can interact with, that serves as a representative of your body, mind, and soul, and is linked to the same."

"Why?" Weiss asks.

It doesn't really surprise you that, of all of RWBY and JNPR, Weiss would have the most trouble with this. She is highly rational in a way the others aren't. Her problems with Blake aren't strictly a product of her imagination. It'd probably be easier for all of you if they had been. Instead, they come from knowing just what the White Fang had done to family, friends, and employees, and projecting that into her relationship with her teammate.

"When your instructors first started teaching you about aura, did you know how to feel it? How to manipulate it?"

"Of course not."

"Exactly. Since you will no longer be using an activated aura, but rather that which _generates_ aura, many of those lessons will need to be relearned. Creating an interface accomplishes two critical goals. First, it will start to familiarize you with manipulating your inner strength much as your previous training taught you to recognize and channel an active aura. More importantly, it will establish a foundation for almost everything to follow."

* * *

Weiss noted the softly glowing sheet that shrouded her partner's bed and frowned. A little late-night studying was one thing, but this was getting ridiculous. She lifted the sheet, and a carefully prepared lecture died before it could be uttered.

By the glow of her headboard lamp, Ruby was asleep. Her face was planted in a binder full of notes, and she had two textbooks—and a legal pad full of notes—open, and four empty mugs. But it was Ruby's open scroll that captured Weiss' attention.

Sparing Ruby a quick glance, she reached over and plucked up the device. It was currently set up to show…academic scores? That would be useful. Good scores in combat and armory and Grimm studies, Weiss noticed absently as she made a mental note to ask Ruby where she could find the application so she could track her own, not so much for her other cour—

That couldn't be right.

She glanced at Ruby, then back at the scroll. There was a grade for an assignment they hadn't even gotten back yet! In fact, many of the entries had little notes or notations that were consistent within grades from a specific class, but _only_ that class. Each class had its own notations.

 _Somehow_ , Ruby had linked her scroll to the Professors' gradebooks!

Weiss touched an icon, and the program closed. But it _also_ revealed the folder (Leader Stuff) it had been placed in. And listed as sub-subfolders in a subfolder named 'Grades' was not only Ruby, but Sister, Partner, and Friend.

Not just grades. There were more subfolders listed by neat, tidy little subjects. Medical history, disciplinary, judicial, vehicles, contact, location…

Weiss quickly sat on her bed and pulled out her own scroll. It took less than a minute to find the student handbook. Yes, team leaders would be informed of disciplinary issues and poor grades and in upper years often had to make emergency medical decisions. But there was nothing that suggested they'd have access to the amount of information implied by Ruby's scroll!

She started to open her own grade report, but paused. She flipped to the judicial tab. Both Ruby's and her folders were very minimal in size. Yang's, judging by the size of the file, was not—wild parties and drunken antics, no doubt. And so was Blake's. In fact, Blake's looked to be quite sizable.

Weiss started to open it, but hesitated again. _"_ _Not that any of you have stuff to worry about because I enjoy stories and can wait for you to tell them to me…"_ That insufferable cookie-gobbling _dolt_ , she seethed. But she backed out once more and opened 'contacts', then firmly tapped 'Weiss' and then her emergency contact. No doubt it'd be her father, but it'd be interesting to see if they were the public lines to the house or office, or if she had the private codes that bypassed the secretar—

 _Winter?_ Weiss stared at her sister's holopic before her gaze swept down the orderly infographics. Not just her civilian line, but…those _had_ to be her military contact codes. The ones that even she herself did not have.

More than a little shaken, Weiss closed the folder, then locked the scroll. She slowly stood and placed it on Ruby's be—

"I'm not asleep!" Ruby protested as her body jerked upright, a page of notes ripping from the binder as it was firmly plastered to the left side of her face.

"Dolt," Weiss said, remembering to breathe.

"Weiss!" Ruby yelped. "This isn't what it looks like! I wasn't sleeping! I was—I need to go!"

"You need to sleep," Weiss corrected.

"No, uh, I mean…I _really_ needtogo!"

Weiss blinked at her, then the four mugs registered and with a sigh she stepped back.

"Uh, I know you don't like me using my sembl—"

Weiss snapped her fingers and pointed, trying not to sigh as her hair and nightgown were buffeted by gale-force winds and the room suddenly smelled of rose petals. It was far too late, and she was far too tired to worry about cleaning them, and a few were always missed anyway.

At least they'd dissipate on their own before they totally wilted.

"So, um…"

Weiss glowered at her partner. "Even Blake has a better taste in reading material to fall asleep with," she said, peeling notepaper from Ruby's face.

"Uh…"

"Stay there," Weiss ordered. She turned and closed textbooks, stacking them and the binder neatly together before crossing to place them on Ruby's desk. The coffee mugs joined them. Then she handed Ruby her scroll, retrieved her own, and pulled Ruby from the dorm room to the small kitchenette for their block of dorms. It was, given the hour, unsurprisingly empty. But then, it was rarely used even during the day.

She parked Ruby in a chair, then went to the refrigerator and poured them both mugs of milk. She placed one in front of Ru— _when_ had she grabbed that cloak?—by, sipped her own mug, and then placed it down firmly in front of her.

"Alright," she said. "Explain."

"It's all Torchwick's fault," Ruby said.

"Roman Torchwick? The thief?" Weiss asked.

"Crescent Rose doesn't like off-the-shelf ammo," Ruby said. "I hand-load each one special, just for her. I was running low and From Dust to Dawn is open real late so I stopped in to pick up some more bullets and casings and I saw they had the new _Weapons!_ issue. And that's when Roman Torchwick and a bunch of goons came in to rob the place. Funny though, they weren't after the money, he wanted the Dust. Anyway, I broke it up, chased him, Professor Goodwitch showed up, and we fought them off."

"Them?" Weiss asked.

"Torchwick, he had this creepy shadow-lady who was really fond of fire, and they got away in a bullhead. Anyway, after that Professor Ozpin offered me a plate of cookies and the chance to come to Beacon early."

"Of course, he did," Weiss said. Really, she didn't know why she should be surprised.

"And…that's it, really."

"No. That is _not_ it," Weiss said. "It does not explain your grades, or—"

"My grades?" Ruby asked quickly. "There's nothing wrong with my grades!"

 _Shit!_ Weiss' eyes narrowed. "You're spending more time cuddled up with books than Blake does. And she at least has some literary taste, as warped as it may be. One does not stay up to all hours with textbooks if one is a pillar of academic excellence."

"But—"

"Do I need to tell Yang? You do recall that part about having a goodnight's sleep?" Her threat to go to Winter had certainly worked wonders on Whitley when they had been much younger…

"No, please, not that!"

…and apparently the 'tell big sister' line worked here as well. "Then start explaining, Ruby."

"I skipped two years," Ruby said, wrapping the cloak around her shoulders and pulling the cowl down over her head as she hunched inside the red material. "That's it, really. I know Crescent Rose and I are an awesome team, and, well, I just get weapons. They're soo cool! And Professor Port has great stories and they're all about how to hunt Grimm! But…I'm not being _graded_ on those two years, but apparently there was a lot of stuff taught that everyone assumes I know…"

"And because you don't, it's making the other course work difficult," Weiss finished.

"Uh…yes?"

"This, we can fix," Weiss said.

"We can?"

"And you don't need to learn everything in the first two weeks."

"I don't?"

"A month should be more than sufficient."

Ruby squeaked and Weiss resisted the urge to sigh.

"That was a _joke_ , you…dolt," Weiss sighed.

Ruby lifted her hood slightly so that silver eyes peered out from under it. "You tell jokes?"

"The things I do for this team," Weiss said in a suffering tone. "The things I put up with…

"From now on, we're doing homework together. Just like the dive calculations."

"But we aren't in the same classes."

"We're in _most_ of the same classes," Weiss said. "And besides, I'll need your help with, gah, _camping_. We have the course syllabi, we should be able to look at what's being covered and go over background material before we get to those sections. For that matter, Yang can help."

"Eh…Yang's always done the minimal necessary to skate through the stuff that doesn't interest her."

"Why am I not surprised?" Weiss asked. "Fine. Let me know if Yang, or, Oum help us, _Blake_ , show signs of slacking. You may be Team Leader, Ruby, but I will not be on a team of halfwits or academic failures. I really will not."

"Don't you think halfwit is a bit strong?" Ruby asked hesitantly. "I mean…Blake?"

Weiss glowered at her. "I am Weiss Schnee, and I expect, no, I _demand_ , the best," she huffed.

Ruby blinked. "You're being difficult~," she said with a sleepy smile. "But if you try to be nicer, I'll support you on avoiding academic failure."

"Fair enough," Weiss said softly. "Come on, let's get you back to bed…partner."

* * *

Glynda glanced up as the chime on her office door sounded, then back down at her desk and grimaced at the paperwork that had fallen out of its tidy little stacks. She jogged them back into order before nodding sharply. "Enter!"

The door swung open and Ruby Rose entered, closing it once more behind her.

"What can I do for you, Ms. Rose?"

"My, uh, Team RWBY has some problems…"

Glynda inclined her head slightly. While she couldn't fault Ozpin's reasoning for the chaotic nature by which partners and teams were formed—understanding just how uncaring the world outside the Kingdoms were, self-reliance, and the ability to trust the inherently untrustable (while also making account for their lack of trustableness) were essential for their students to have any chance of long-term survival—she couldn't help but wish they had the opportunity to…tweak the occasional pairing or team. Between Ruby's early admission _and_ status as team leader, the presence of an older sister, and the placement of Weiss Schnee and Blake Belladonna on the same team, Team RWBY had more than its fair share of potential trouble points. The only other first year team that came close was JNPR. Although that team mostly suffered from a single ill-chosen member. Team CRDL at least should acceptable internal dynamics even if their behavior was otherwise atrocious. And then there was—

"…and I want us to run a patrol."

Glynda paused, pulled from her reflection by the last eight words spilling out in a sudden rush. She played the conversation back in her memory to see if she had missed something between Ruby Rose admitting her team had problems, to wanting to run a patrol…

No, that was it.

"Your team is having problems, so you want to run a patrol?" she asked, just to be sure.

"Yep!"

When no further detail was forthcoming Glynda frowned.

"Uh…I mean, if that's okay?" Ruby asked nervously.

"Patrols are not usually assigned to first year teams," Glynda said.

"Um…"

"What problems?" Glynda asked.

"Uh-wha?"

"What problems is your team experiencing, and how will running a patrol rectify them?"

"Oh, well, uh… Weiss has never been camping. And the equipment budget is by semester and use-or-lose."

The first was…perfectly reasonable. As was the second. All students were told this, though the number of first-semester (even first _year_ ) students who either didn't listen, or didn't understand (and more importantly, didn't ask for clarification) was rather high. High enough that the unclaimed 'equipment allotment' for first-semester students had been very useful in balancing other parts of the budget in recent years.

Ruby was giving her an expectant look that Glynda quelled with a frown.

"That's it?" she asked.

"Yep!"

"I see…" Glynda considered Ruby for a long moment. "I take it you have a plan to ensure your team's coursework does not falter during this…excursion?"

"Yep!"

Glynda turned to her computer and brought up the patrol routes. It would never do to send a team this new—especially not one with the daughters of Taiyang Xiao Long, Jacques Schnee, or Ghira and Kali Belladonna—into a situation where the risk of death or dismemberment was too high.

Oh, and one mustn't forget the Branwen twins, Glynda added with a mental wince she carefully kept from her face.

"Very well, Team RWBY is assigned a light reconnaissance patrol this weekend in the Forest of Forever Fall. Egress and extraction by bullhead will be provided, as will route plan. Your primary task will be to ascertain threat levels and chart Grimm populations. You may engage singleton and small groups at will, but are to avoid heavy contact. Please acquire pictorial and video evidence and map any Grimm sightings or kills.

"Your patrol duration will be four days, three nights. Bring fifty percent excess supplies. Emergency channels will be monitored and extraction provided if necessary, but depending on what flights are in the area, support may be some hours away." It wouldn't, but Team RWBY didn't need to know that.

"Do be aware of current climate additions and plan appropriately for both clothing and any campfires or activities you may wish to partake in. Live fire is authorized, but again, be aware of your environment before expending ordnance or Dust." The last, well, second-to-last thing they needed was for RWBY, or Ruby, to burn the forest down.

"No." Ruby said as she examined Weiss' scroll. She picked up Blake's. "No." She reached for Yang's. "N—" she broke off as she actually _looked_ at Yang's, then looked away in a hurry as her cheeks heated. "Really, Yang? _Really?_ "

"I wanted to make sure you were really looking," Yang said unapologetically.

"So you show me…that?" Ruby demanded.

"Eh, it's my job as a big sister to corrupt you."

"What if _Weiss_ showed me that?"

"Miss Prim and Proper?" Yang asked.

"Blake then."

"Don't draw me into this." Blake didn't look from where she sat on her bunk reading. She did, however, flip a page.

"She'd better not have," Yang growled. "Big sister trumps partner."

"Well, I suppose it's nice to know where I stand," Blake said.

"What's wrong with my selections?" Weiss demanded.

"We're talking about _huntressing gear_ , not what's being worn on the red carpet at the premier of a Spruce Willis movie," Ruby said.

"I know that," Weiss huffed.

"Then why did you go down the list and order the most expensive item in each category?" Ruby asked.

"Because it's the best, and I refuse to use anything less."

"No," Ruby said. "It is not the best. Just the most expensive. You didn't even look at any of the reviews, did you? And Blake, the _least_ expensive?"

"No need to spend more than you have to," Blake said firmly.

"You do know our equipment allocation doesn't roll into subsequent semesters?" Ruby asked.

"Yes."

"And you can't use the remainder on books."

"I wasn't…" Blake looked up with a thoughtful frown. "Do you think if I said they were relevant—"

"No," Ruby, Weiss, and Yang said at the same time.

Blake huffed a little. "What's wrong with Yang's, then?"

"Oh. She'll just get whatever she thinks looks coolest."

"Guilty," Yang agreed happily.

"Fortunately, you have me!" Ruby said happily. "And we're going to do this again… To the lounge!"


	11. Volume 1, Chapter 9: A Walk in the Woods

**Disclaimer:** Once again, no ownership intended or implied. Enjoy responsibly.

* * *

Ruby's preferred lounge was the one she and Weiss had discovered for their first Spruce Willis movie night. Since then they'd done two more, inviting Yang and Blake to join them. But this time when she entered, Ruby immediately noticed that someone had come through and changed things.

The usual furniture was gone. Instead of a half-dozen beanbag chairs scattered about the room, there were instead a pair of (small) couch and recliner sets pushed out of the way against the walls. A single, very large beanbag chair dominating the center of the room flanked by a pair of small, low tables, with a third, somewhat longer but equally low table placed in front.

"But…but…where are the chairs?" she asked.

Blake shrugged. Weiss's mouth was tight as she examined the furniture.

"That's easy," Yang said, spilling Blake into the beanbag chair. "We'll share."

"If we must," Weiss said, climbing in to sit next to Blake.

"Oh…yeah, that works too," Ruby said as she hopped in next to Weiss and sank in deeply enough that she wondered if she'd be able to get out. "Oof, I can't…help?" she squeaked as the buttery-soft leather closed over her.

"Of all the…" Weiss voice said.

There was pressure on her shoulders, and then Ruby found herself hauled up by her cloak.

"You okay there, Sis?"

"Fine," Ruby said, snuggling in closer to Weiss lest the chair try to eat her again. "This is pretty good."

"Why are we here?" Weiss asked. "I would think a visit to the quartermaster would be more appropriate."

"Better if we have an idea of what we want first," Ruby said. "Let's start with backpacks. We aren't going to just grab the most expensive item available."

"Why not? A high price assures high quality," Weiss said.

"Also that you have more money than sense," Blake said.

" _Because_ ," Ruby interjected before Weiss could reply. "Besides quality, price is affected by features. You don't know just from the price tag that it has the features you want. If it doesn't, then you'll need to buy a new pack anyway. And even if it does, some of those features may be ones that you'll never use. So why pay for something you don't need?"

"Have you met Weiss?" Yang asked.

"Hey!"

"That's just Weiss being Weiss," Ruby said. "We're talking about _huntressing_."

"I'm not sure she understands the difference," Blake said dryly.

"And you," Ruby said.

"Gear breaks. It makes sense to have a reserve to get replacements."

"True," Ruby said. "It is _also_ true that better quality gear will break _less_."

"Wait, you mean I'm right?" Weiss asked.

"No. I mean you are _both_ right," Ruby said. "So first we look at features, then at reviews. And we see right away that Weiss' backpack is right out without even getting to the features."

"That backpack has five-star reviews!"

"Three of them," Ruby said. "Of three reviews. Don't trust five-star anythings. All they are is 'this whatever is sooooo great'. You can't trust one-stars either, those are 'this whatever is soooooooooo bad,' though sometimes they use a bunch of words Yang doesn't approve of me knowing. You want to start at the three-stars. Two and four are okay once you need to start narrowing down your choice, but three-stars are honest. Three stars are where people take the time and tell it to you straight, the good points and the not-so-good points. Then you can go back and look at the ones and fives. Don't bother with the one-or-two liners, you want the ones were people spent a paragraph or more talking about it.

"Once we've narrowed it down some we can worry about it looking cool. And _then_ you are going to come up with three choices and actually try them on with Professor Pullman to help to make sure that everything is good to go."

* * *

"No," Ruby sighed, looking at Weiss. She looked over at Blake who looked pretty comfortable, aside from treating her gear as though it was going to fall apart if she breathed on it. Blake looked at her, then at her own partner.

Yang looked even more comfortable than Blake. Also, her pack had awkward-shaped bulges.

"What?" Weiss demanded.

"You look as though you packed using the Atlesian Military Field Guide," Ruby said.

"So?"

Ruby sighed. "Blake, help Yang? She probably just shoved a bunch of stuff into her pack without looking."

"I looked," Yang said in a hurt tone.

"Notice how she didn't refute that she shoved a bunch of stuff into her pack?"

"I noticed," Blake assured her.

"Uh-huh," Yang said, crossing her arms protectively as she took a step back. "And just how many books are you packing?"

Blake hesitated. "Two."

Weiss turned and stared at her open-mouthed.

"Right. Sure," Yang said. "We believe you."

"I packed them," Ruby said.

"Wait… _Blake_ let you pack her books?" Yang said.

"I couldn't choose and Ruby said I could only take the two," Blake said with a vaguely bitter tone softened by a slight smile. "So I narrowed them down then she picked two and packed them."

"And she can't peek to see which ones until we set up camp," Ruby said.

"What's to stop her from figuring it out by what's missing?" Yang asked.

Ruby pointed at the blanket she'd draped over the bookcase. "If she peeks, she has KP the entire patrol."

"Okay, yeah, that might work."

"Regardless, there is nothing wrong with my pack," Weiss insisted.

"Draw a Dust grenade."

Weiss' left hand came up, crossing in front of her body to the right shoulder strap, then immediately crossed back and pulled a cylinder from a sleeve on her left strap. She waved it twice, then slid it back away.

"Now draw Myrtenaster and a reloading vial."

Weiss drew her sword with practiced ease, the reloading vial—with her right hand—took a bit more but was also a smooth motion. Then she exchanged both, nearly dropping the vial in the process. "I need to get use to the pouch placement," she noted.

"That's one option," Ruby agreed. "Or you can reverse it."

"Excuse me?"

"These pouches, they're modular. The Atlas manual assumes a right-handed configuration," Ruby explained. "You, partner dear, are left-hand dominant."

"I know that! The manual—"

"Is for basic recruit training," Ruby said as she began to take pouches off Weiss' shoulder straps and hip belt. "Once you graduate you are allowed to reconfigure your gear to something that best suits you. And, Weiss, you aren't an Atlas recruit. You are a huntress-in-training at Beacon Academy."

"I know that too!" Weiss huffed and shook her head. "How do you even know these things?"

"Have you met my sister?" Yang asked. "She's obsessed with weapons and gear—"

"I am not."

"—that will allow her to kill monsters."

"Which explains why she has read a field manual that is _supposed_ to be restricted to Atlesian Military, but doesn't know a thing about Dust formulation."

"That's what I have you for," Ruby agreed. "Why do you even wear Myrtenaster on your left side? A cross-draw would be far more efficient, and less risky in an emergency."

"Excuse me?" Weiss asked sharply.

"You've obviously practiced that draw," Ruby said. "That's how you can flip it from a reverse to a forward grip so fast. But it does mean there is a moment during the transition where your grip is weak."

"It's the normal place to carry a sword."

Ruby frowned. "I'm not going to like why you put up with normal at the expense of practical, am I?" Instead of replying she fastened a final pouch to Weiss' hip belt, gave it a satisfied smile, and tugged to make sure that everything was secured properly.

Her smile melted into another frown. "Lean forward."

"What are you on about now?" Weiss asked.

"Lean forward. Here, brace yourself on the desk," Ruby said as she manhandled Weiss into the position she wanted. She adjusted Weiss' pack slightly. "Take a deep breath…now push it all out." She paused, then pulled sharply on the adjustment straps of Weiss' hip-belt.

" _Oof_ ," Weiss grunted, straightening up. "I'd like to still be able to _breathe_ you dolt!"

Ruby ignored her and she adjusted Weiss' shoulder straps. "You want to carry the weight of the pack on your hips. The shoulder straps and chest cinch are just to hold everything in place and keep the bag from flopping around."

* * *

"Has anyone ever told you that you complain too much?" Yang asked as her feet crunched red and gold leaves.

"No."

"You complain too much."

"Funny," Weiss stated. "All I'm saying is that I don't understand why we have to do all this walking. I thought the point of this was to familiarize me with _camping_."

"And if we stayed in one place you'd be bored to tears all day," Yang said. "Just be happy we've still got reception from the CCT in Vale or you'd be using paper and a compass," she added, nodding to the scroll in Weiss' hand.

"Don't be ridiculous. I'd be using a general positioning unit."

"No, you wouldn't."

"Yes, I would," Weiss said.

"Yang's right," Ruby said.

"Excuse me?"

"GPUs are heavier and more bulky than map and compass," Ruby said. "They consume Dust, without which they're basically a fancy rock, and they just aren't that accurate. Well, they're okay within mapped areas. But outside the Kingdoms, once you get away from locator pins and communication towers, they fall back on an inertial guidance. That's okay at telling you where you are in relation to where you were when you were last within range of a pin or tower. But it's _only_ okay, and it doesn't do even an okay job at showing what's around you."

"You forgot, Dad and Uncle Qrow have been at this for a while. And Rubes is a weapon and gear snob."

"I'm not a snob," Ruby disagreed. "Just a…tad overenthusiastic."

"The point is," Yang continued, "you can take sightings of three major landmarks, and use that to triangulate exactly where you are with more confidence than a GPU. For that matter, I could whip together a field-expedient sextant and I have the Vale Nautical Almanac on my scroll."

"You can do celestial navigation," Weiss said flatly.

"Too hard to believe?"

"In a word? Yes."

Yang gave her a hurt look.

"I've seen your math scores, Yang."

"Yeah," Yang muttered. "And I still haven't forgiven Ruby for that."

"It's for your own good," Ruby said resolutely.

"I know," Yang said sweetly. "That's why I left the cookies at home."

Ruby stumbled, caught herself, and straightened to stare at her sister. "You didn't!"

"So totally did."

"But that's…that's…"

"Inconceivable?" Blake suggested.

"Unconscionable?" Weiss added.

"Evil," Ruby said. "Immoral. Quite possibly illegal."

"But certainly not fattening," Yang grinned.

"Getting back to your sister's math scores," Weiss said. "I'd like an explanation."

Yang shrugged. "I can do it for real, just not when it's theory."

"And those atrocious answers on the last quiz?" Weiss asked.

"We've had _one_ quiz," Yang stressed. "Early days."

"I repeat, those atrocious answers on the last quiz?"

"I told you, I don't do theory well."

"They were word problems."

"Not real-world."

"Real-world is a word problem. _Life_ is a word problem."

"Eh?" Yang asked.

"Fortunately, I packed along a packet of problems for us to work on together," Weiss said.

"You did?" Yang asked in growing horror.

"Yes. Team RWBY's Academic Couch is a responsibility I take seriously. I also packed cookies for Ruby."

"Best. Partner. _Ever!_ " Ruby squealed. "I'm going to hug you."

"Don't you— _oof_."

Blake chuckled softly.

Yang sidled over to her partner. "Y'know, I think that's the first time you've smiled since we got off the bullhead."

Blake's smile died.

"Awww." Yang nudged Blake with an elbow. "Come on, Blakey. What's wrong?"

"Nothing," Blake said. "I just have some bad memories of this forest."

"Want to talk about them?"

Blake turned to Ruby who still had one arm around Weiss—nifty trick, considering their backpacks. If Ruby, who in addition to the youngest was carrying the second-largest pack and the heaviest weapon of the four, was bothered by the weight of gear she was carrying, it wasn't apparent. In comparison to her partner, Weiss just looked awkward.

Which was about how Blake felt. "Not particularly."

Ruby nodded. "There should be a stream about two klicks from here. I thought that'd be a good landmark for tonight's camp."

"That'd still be a bit early for camp," Blake said.

"Eh, we can take off early and laze about while we tell Weiss how to do stuff."

"Thank you ever so much."

"Well, Yang and I can. Blake can find a tree to read a book in."

Despite herself Blake chuckled and nodded. Bad feelings attracted Grimm. Ruby's banter, like her offer for Blake to share (and hopefully release) whatever was bothering her, and Yang's teasing and bad jokes, were all ways of defusing those feelings.

* * *

"I thought you said there was a stream," Blake noted.

"That's what the patrol map said," Ruby replied.

The forest in all its vibrant glory was spread out before them, and behind them. But splitting the two was a lot more than a stream. It was more of a river, really, though not one that was swift or deep, at least not the portions near their bank. At some point sand had piled up five or six meters out. Between where they now stood and it, the water was clear, shallowish, and while not exactly lazy it wasn't particularly fast. On the far side of the bar, the water was murky, judging from a stick floating by it was quite swift and (probably) rather deep.

"Well at least we'll have a source of water," Yang said.

Blake hummed thoughtfully as she set her pack against a tree, and began pulling off her low-heeled boots.

"Uh, I suppose we can go swimming," Yang said.

"I didn't pack my suit," Weiss said with a frown.

"You need a suit?" Yang asked, but her eyes were on her partner as Blake peeled off her stockings.

Weiss sputtered. "You-you barbarian!"

"Just because Vale isn't as frigid as Atlas doesn't mean you should call people names," Yang said.

"You…" Weiss hissed.

"Yes?"

Weiss gestured at Yang, then at the water.

"Eh? I figure it's what god gave me," Yang said with a shrug. "Besides, I can't recall hearing any complaints."

"Who'd complain," Blake said.

"Good point."

"Blake," Ruby said as Blake started to ease down the stone embankment, still wearing her shorts, blouse, and vest. "What are you doing?"

"Testing a theory," Blake said. The water came up just over her knees and she moved slowly along the embankment. "If I'm right…" she abruptly ducked down, her hands groping in the water, only to stand just as abruptly a minute later as a fish landed at Weiss' feet.

"Gah!"

"Dinner," Blake said with a happy smile. "If I can find another two or three…"

"Great. Rubes and I will set up camp. Weiss can help you clean them."

"Clean them?" Weiss asked. "I assume that's a euphemism of some kind?"

"Gut," Blake said.

"Tell you what," Weiss said instantly. "I'll let Ruby teach me how to set up camp and _Yang_ can help you."

"Nope!"

Weiss gave her partner a hurt look.

"It'll be a good learning experience, Weiss," Ruby said.

"Sure, that too," Yang said.

"You don't think it'll be?" Ruby asked, her brow wrinkling.

"No. I just think it'll be amusing as hell."

"I hate you," Weiss deadpanned.

"Catch!"

" _Gah!_ " Weiss jumped back as another fish came flying at her.

"That's dinner," Blake said quickly. "Don't let it flop back in."

"How am I supposed to do that?"

"Break it's back," Yang shrugged. "Hit it on the head with a rock."

The fish gave one final flop as Myrtenaster pinned it to the ground.

"Oookay, you can do that too," Yang agreed.

"If you're going to do that, poke it in the head," Blake instructed. "That way you won't ruin the fillets."

"I don't know why I bother…"

* * *

Blake was not skipping when she and Weiss came into camp, but it was close.

A rather disgruntled-looking Weiss, with her combat skirt rather redder than it had been before, trailed after holding four trout—gutted, but with head, tails, and scales—out in front of her at arm's length.

"You did that on purpose, didn't you?" Weiss asked as Yang took the fish.

"To quote sis: Yep!"

"I hate you," Weiss said with very little energy. She looked down at her clothes. "At least it's _supposed_ to be stain-proof."

"Was the sealant Huntress Approved?" Ruby asked.

"I think so?"

"Take it off and hold it in the stream. It should come right off."

Weiss considered this for a moment. "And if it doesn't?"

"Why do you think I wear black?"

Weiss sighed, then looked around and frowned. "I thought you were setting up the campsite?"

"We did," Yang said.

"Then where are our sleeping bags?"

Yang jerked a thumb upwards. "Ruby wanted to try out the hammock function."

"Of course, she did," Weiss said wearily. She sat on one of the camp stools Yang and Ruby had set up, and watched Yang. The fish had gone onto a platter and set aside. Now Yang's attention was on…a pile of dirt. "What are you doing?"

"Putting up a mound for a fire," Yang said, gesturing with one hand to a pile of sticks that ranged from twigs to something the thickness of Weiss' wrist.

When no more explanation was forthcoming Weiss sighed. "Why?"

"Some patrol lines have established camps," Yang said. "Some heavily used ones can range from cabins with armories and other creature comforts, up to permanently garrisoned forts. The problem with them, as Uncle Qrow puts it, they're predictable and make you lazy. The first means you aren't effective at the job, the second makes you dead."

"Lovely."

"The opposite of that is zero-trace," Yang continued as though Weiss hadn't spoken. "You don't leave any trace that you've been in an area. Useful in some cases, but if bandits or whoever don't know that you're in the area you aren't having a deterring effect either. Also, it takes a lot of work and effort, mostly in cleanup."

"You have to pack out your trash, your campfire ash, your shi—"

"Blake's pretty much nailed it," Yang agreed. "Between the two is low-impact. It isn't as intensive as zero-trace, but you throw in a little effort so you don't muck things up for any civs or hunters who are coming through, and aren't totally invisible to any bandits either.

"Now heat from a campfire will pretty much kill any ground cover and cook the soil so it won't sprout anything for a long time. Years, possibly. So you throw down a tarp to make cleanup easy, then pile on dirt—" Yang threw a hand out towards the forest, "—there's a dead tree out thataway and I got this from the area disturbed when it got uprooted, and then build the fire on top of that. When we're done, we scatter the ashes and leftover wood around the campsite, the dirt goes back in the hole, we shake out the tarp, and we're good to go."

She did something with a ball of…stuff that Weiss didn't quite see, then abruptly thrust ball into the mound of sticks and twigs she constructed.

"Do you need Dust? I have burn—"

"Save it," Yang said, leaning forward and blowing harshly. She blew again, then sat back as a tongue of fire licked up.

"How did you…"

"Fire kit," Yang said, lifting her right hand and shaking so something rattled. "That way I never need to worry about running out of Dust."

Weiss frowned. "This is going to take longer to learn than I thought, isn't it?"

Yang shrugged in reply. "It's a different environment than you're used to. So…probably not as long as you might think. I mean, if you had to learn it all out here, maybe. But a lot of the individual skills, like this, you don't _have_ to be in the woods." She added a few more sticks to the fire. "Okay. We'll let that burn down to coals."

"Yang…" Weiss took a deep breath. "Could I talk to you for a second?" she glanced at Blake. "Alone."

Yang turned to give her a curious look, then at her own partner who shrugged in reply.

"Sure," she said. "It'll give Blake a chance to get her book out without looking eager."

Blake snorted, but Yang motioned for Weiss to lead on.

"So…" Yang drawled.

"How does one…go…in the woods?" Weiss asked.

"Go?"

Weiss flushed and her jaw clenched. "There isn't exactly a…a privy."

"Gotcha," Yang said with a nod. "Go sixty meters, seventy-five is better but at least sixty, from any campsite, trail, or water source. Scrape aside the ground cover—leaves and such—and dig a hole, fifteen to twenty centimeters deep. Put the dirt in a separate pile from the ground cover. Ruby and I both brought shovels. Squat, just like in the gym. You might want to look for a tree you can lean against or a limb you can hang onto for balance since you don't have a weight. Toss the paper in the hole, it'll biodegrade. Then kick the dirt back in and spread the ground cover back over. Make sure you bring the shovel back with you."

"That's… Thank you."

Yang frowned. "For what?"

"For not making this more difficult than it had to be," Weiss said.

Yang's expression grew hurt. "Do you really think I'd—" she broke off and looked away. "Yeah. I joke. And I needle people. Because keeping it real, breaking up tension, diverting people from feeling bad…it keeps the Grimm away. And…I'm getting the feeling that we all may have had…let's call it 'less than happy' childhoods. So jokes, puns, they're my way of dealing."

Her head swiveled back, and her eyes were lilac lasers. "But I don't ever want to hurt or humiliate someone. That you think I would—"

"You haven't," Weiss said quickly. "I didn't mean to imply you do. And I thank you…you could have made this far more difficult than it could be."

Yang didn't speak for a long moment, then her shoulders heaved as she breathed sharply. "I get the feeling that you know someone, someone reeeeaaal close to you, who _would_ do it to hurt or humiliate."

Weiss flinched and looked away.

"Hey." Yang reached over and touched Weiss' arm. "Hey, Weiss, it's me. Look at me, okay?"

Weiss blinked. "You used my name? My real name?"

"Uh?"

"Who are you and what have you done with Yang?"

"Funny," Yang said, a smile tracing across her face. "I could probably say the same about you cracking a joke. You gonna be okay?"

"Why do you care?"

Yang's smile faltered. "I don't know. I just do." Her hand fell away from Weiss. "Weiss…have you ever had anyone care about you before?"

Weiss didn't reply.

"Look… After Mom died, Dad didn't handle it well. So… I care because for a couple of years I _had_ to care because there was no one else _to_ care. Not really. I guess it just sort of became a habit."

"Oh." Weiss stepped away. "Um…you mentioned toilet paper?"

"Uh, yeah… Thought you might have forgotten." Yang reached into her belt pouch and came out with a slightly squashed roll. "Five lien a sheet."

" _What?!_ "

"To the unit coffer," Yang said, holding the roll over her head.

Weiss glowered at her.

Yang grinned.

"Fine." Weiss held out a hand and Yang flipped the roll into it. Then she pulled out a garden trowel with a black anodized blade and offered it to Weiss handle-first. Weiss snatched it, turned, and stalked deeper towards the forest.

She went four steps.

"Winter."

Weiss turned back to Yang. "You asked if I ever had someone care about me before. My older sister. Winter."

"Gotcha," Yang said with a nod. "And Weiss? If I go too far, just tell me, 'kay?"

* * *

"Dinner!" Ruby called. "We've got trout, courtesy of Blake, stuffed with wild sage, also courtesy of Blake, and wild onions and lemon wedges, courtesy of Yang, with salt, pepper, and butter and wrapped in bacon, courtesy of me. We have steak, courtesy of Yang. Weiss brought enough milk for tonight and breakfast—"

"I did?" Weiss asked.

"I hid the ice-Dust thermoses in your pack. You carried them, you get credit," Ruby said. "Also, Weiss found a berry patch and completely didn't tell anyone or forage anything. Boo. Hiss."

"Boo. Hiss." Blake and Yang repeated dutifully, though the effect was somewhat spoiled by the latter's broad grin.

"Fortunately, I was paying attention so we have wild raspberries and strawberries for desert."

"You saved us some strawberries?" Yang asked in fake surprise.

"Just for that, _you_ can have one of the swing watches. Speaking of. First."

"Last," Weiss said instantly. She gave Ruby's open palm a sideways look, but the expectant expression on her partner's face wore her down and she reluctantly slapped at it lightly.

"You think they planned that, Blake?" Yang asked.

"It did look rehearsed," her partner commented.

Weiss sniffed as Ruby forked a trout onto a plate, then one of the steaks, and passed the plate to her.

"Odds or evens?" Blake offered, holding out a fist.

Yang shook her head. "Even," she said. Then counted out her partner's two fingers with the five she extended and sighed.

"Second," Blake said happily as she accepted her own food.

"Third," Yang sighed. "But Weiss is responsible for making coffee in the morning."

* * *

You have a lot of regrets in your life.

In the grand scheme of things, not intervening that day in the mess hall when Winchester bullied Velvet is so far down the list it doesn't have a number.

But you'd have been lying to yourself if you thought you weren't looking forward to it.

You can't help those other regrets. Your friends are mostly all dead, those who aren't probably would have been better off if they were. And in any case, they're so far in your past (or future?) that you won't ever see them again. Helping the current-you avoid those regrets is the best plan you have, but it doesn't help with _your_ regrets.

The chance to…intervene?

That is a purely selfish soon-to-be not-regret. Your chance to both make up for your long-ago non-intervention _and_ the chance to squish Cardin Winchester like a bug?

In all honesty, what is there _not_ to look forward to?

It's not yet that particular day, and Winchester isn't going after Velvet, but you have already decided just how you are going to…remonstrate with Team CRDL when a hand on your shoulder stops you.

"Headmaster."

"Professor," Ozpin replies. "May I ask what your plan is?"

"I plan to conduct an impromptu course on interspecies relations."

You don't remember the young woman Winchester is currently harassing. She hasn't stopped by your office. Nor do you know exactly what is being said. But then, you don't really need to. Anyone with one will tell you that having your tail pulled hurts. And the jokes about foxes are hardly new or original. The species component, with the implication that a person is more animal than sentient and thus worthy of abuse the same person wouldn't heap upon an actual animal, is bad enough. The casually implied threat of sexual violence is almost worse.

"No. You are not."

You look at Ozpin. He did not just tell you—

"You will not interfere, Professor," he repeats.

"Explain yourself," you reply in a low voice that clearly states that if his explanation does not satisfy you then someone will be seeing violence tonight after all.

"This is an academy for huntsmen and huntresses," he replied. "The things beyond our walls will not care. They will not stop on account of someone's feelings. Quite the reverse, actually."

"So you mean we should just let this continue?" you ask.

"Yes." Ozpin looks past you and you glance back towards CRDL.

"You know they are going to think that you condone this."

"I'm aware they already do," he replied. "And that…certain members of the public feel the same way."

"Then do something about it. You say you want to help—"

"And I do. But I have a choice. I can work to improve relations between humans and faunus. A worthy goal, one with many long-term benefits. Not the least of which is that bigotry and the feelings—on both sides—that go with it are attractive to Grimm, and that anything that diminishes those feelings is imminently worthwhile. Or I can do my job, which is to help prepare the next generation of huntsmen and huntresses."

"And countenancing _this_ helps?" you ask.

"No. But neither does interfering."

"Then how, exactly, is this supposed to be resolved?"

"This is a school of combat, Professor," Ozpin said. "Violence is a perfectly acceptable way of settling accounts."

"And the students know that?"

"There seems to be no shortage of things for them to fight about," Ozpin said. "I might as well provide one more."

"You aren't serious."

"Quite the contrary." Ozpin sighed. "Your concerns are valid, even warranted. Anywhere else, they would be applauded. But self-reliance, and reliance on your team, is essential for the threats our students will face once they graduate. They need to learn that self-reliance now. Even better for those who recognize such a situation and place themselves between danger and one who needs shielding learn how to intervene successfully."

"What if it is beyond their ability to deal with?" you demand. "Or even if they merely _think_ it is?"

"Then they learn to recognize the situation for what it is, how to assess it, and how to find a more advantageous method of engagement, even calling for reinforcements."

"And if it breaks one of them?" you ask.

"Better they do so now than in the field where they would endanger their own life, those of their teammates, and any civilians."

"There's a difference between wanton malice and casual cruelty."

"I don't deny there is." But Ozpin made it clear he wasn't going to change his mind on the matter.

And the hell of it is, listening to his rationale, you aren't positive that he is wrong. He definitely isn't right, but that's not the same thing.

"This…policy," you say, and he inclines his head fractionally, "is appalling."

"I quite agree," he said. "It is, however, as you noticed, _my_ policy."

"I'm not going to turn a student away if they approach me."

"Nor would I want you to do so. In fact, if one does I would _expect_ you to intervene, because that student will have both recognized that they are out of their depth and sought appropriate aid. But until such time as one does approach you, you will not intervene unless someone it put in genuine risk of physical harm, civilians are endangered, or there is a substantial risk of damage to Beacon."

You consider that for a long moment. "Your rules suck, Headmaster."

"They do. They are also the best compromise—or rather the least worst compromise—considering what awaits them after graduation that I've been able to devise."

"Tell me. If she sent Winchester to the infirmary, would you support her?"

"In what way?" Ozpin asked. "She won't have broken any rules, certainly."

"And if Winchester files assault charges in Vale?"

"Beacon is independent of city government. While there is a considerable amount of influence regarding the Kingdom as a whole, the Council cannot and does not interfere in day-to-day affairs. But yes, should she defend herself and Mr. Winchester resort to…other means, I would indeed defend her actions."

"Uh-huh," you say, because now you have him. "And does _she_ know that?"

You can't say why, but the mildly troubled expression on his face doesn't give you a great deal of satisfaction.

* * *

"Are you sure we're supposed to be able to sleep in these things?"

Ruby looked up towards where the hammocks were strung.

"Just lay back and think of glaciers and blizzards, Ice Queen," Yang's voice suggested.

"Funny."

Ruby peered through Crescent Rose's scope. The light-gathering optic brought clarity to vague shadow and…was that a pole sticking out of Yang's hammock?

As she watched, it hooked into the lines anchoring Weiss' hammock.

"Rock a bye _Weiii-sy_ , in the tree-toooop. When the wind blows, the Schneeflake will rooock."

"I am going to _kill_ you, Xiao Long."

Ruby grinned and, because they were trying to sleep, she whispered: "Best. Team. _Ever!_ "

* * *

"What is…this?" Yang stared as the brown, tar-like substance oozed from the ladle and glopped into her mug. She put the ladle back in the pot and had to press to get it below the surface…and even then, the handle remained standing up.

"Coffee," Weiss said from where she was packing her hammock under the direction of Ruby. "Can you pour me a mug?'

"Is it a solid or a liquid?" Yang asked.

"It looks more like a gel," Blake said.

"It was rather cold this morning," Weiss commented, "But I didn't think it was _that_ cold. What's wrong, did I not build the fire hot enough?"

"Oh, I'd say it was plenty hot," Yang said. "Uh, just how much coffee did you make?"

"Four cups. I even boiled the water first, then removed it from the fire before adding the coffee and simmering like you told me to last night," Weiss replied.

"About that… How much grounds did you use?"

"Four cups."

Yang looked up to find Blake staring at her, biting her lower lip.

'Four cups' Yang mouthed.

Blake nodded, quickly bringing up a fist to bite as her eyes glistened in mirth.

"You did say you like strong coffee, Yang," Ruby said in a strangled-sounding voice.

"Did I not do it right?" Weiss' voice asked.

* * *

 **A/N:** I debated about whether or not to do one of these, only for that last scene to force my hand. Pyrrha mentions that almost all gear is a conduit for aura back in season 1, but we don't really see what stuff they have besides weapons. And then we are supposed to believe that _Doctor_ Oobleck can carry enough supplies for five people for, what, three days? Okay, aura can be used to increase his strength and stamina, but his bag must be close kin to a TARDIS to fit in the sleeping bags (and assuming food was scavenged and water purified, or the matter quickly gets worse).

More to the point, and why I started writing the A/N in the first place. I made the decision early on to use metric measurements in this fic. There are…reasons. However, this chapter drew heavily on my own experiences with young campers, and I subjected Weiss to a couple of the more memorable occasions. The 'cups of coffee' made with 'cups of coffee _grounds_ ' was just too hilarious (at the time, it's gotten even more hilarious with age) _not_ to include, but it also doesn't work if done in metric.

*sigh*


	12. Volume 1 Chapter 10: Valentina

**Disclaimer:** Nope, still not owned. Is anyone surprised?

* * *

Valentina was a small village perched just above the Forever Fall forest, up in the foothills of the Forever Fall forest.

Despite being outside the Kingdom of Vale, on the wild side of the Shieldwalls, it looked nice enough, Ruby thought as she led her team towards the main gate. The road wasn't overgrown. The walls were high enough and sturdy enough to deter most ground-Grimm, and in good repair. And work parties kept the forest clear for more than two hundred meters to create an open killing ground.

A man dressed in blue, which must have been a uniform of some kind since he was wearing a gold-colored badge in the shape of a shield, came walking towards them as they neared. "Name and purpose?" he asked as he got close.

"Team RWBY, light patrol out of Beacon," Ruby said. "We're, uh, supposed to be airlifted out tomorrow?"

"Oh," the man said, his shoulders slumping slightly as he fished a notepad off his belt and looked at it. "Yes, we have you on the list."

"Um…what's going on?" Ruby asked.

"Nothing," he said quickly.

"The lookouts on the walls are normal," Blake spoke up, "and your gatehouse is manned, but you came out to meet us."

"Oh." He hesitated. "We have a supply caravan that was supposed to be in yesterday. I was hoping you were messengers coming on ahead."

"We haven't seen anything like that," Ruby said. "A few isolated Grimm, one large concentration two days ago down in the valley that we've marked for an extermination team. Otherwise…it's been quiet."

"Oh," he said again. "Well, that's…good." He looked past them up the road. Then he shook his head. "But where are my manners? I am Officer Jacob Montenegro of the Valentina Watch. Welcome to Valentina."

"Thank you," Ruby said.

* * *

"Did any of you think this town is weird?" Ruby asked.

"I wasn't going to say anything…" Blake's voice trailed off.

Weiss looked at Ruby with pursed lips and nodded once before turning her attention back to her stew.

"A'yep," Yang said thickly, her mouth half-full.

The inn Ruby had chosen catered to caravans, travelers, and huntresses. So it was plainly, if comfortably, furnished. With plain, though comfortable, beds. Baths that were adequate—more than a large tub in the center of a room filled by heating buckets of water in a fireplace, though not much more—with plenty of hot water. And a common room.

Actually, Ruby was pretty sure it should be an _un_ common room since it went up through the whole building. All four floors of it. There was a massive circular hearth, easily big enough for two of her to lay across without touching the rims, in the center with a metal funnel-shaped hood and a chimney that ran up through the center of the space. As it was still early in the day, there wasn't a fire going, but since it was around lunch-time the room was still mostly-full with people.

And food. Mustn't forget food.

Thick, tasty stew. Slabs of freshly baked bread with tubs of butter that had probably been mooing earlier in the day. Strips of some unidentifiable meat that had been pounded, spiced, and grilled. And what Yang said was the best beer she'd ever tasted and even Wiess described as 'potable.' Ruby had tried some, decided it wasn't bad, but then asked for milk. What she'd gotten had to be at least as fresh as the butter and with the frothy top on the other mugs, you couldn't even see the difference. For that matter, they all had matching mustaches!

"The _onsen_ is world-famous," Blake said.

" _Onsen_?" Ruby asked.

"Spas," Weiss said. "Mineral hot-springs," she added with a nod. "That explains the buildings up the street. They are meant to look rustic, and some care was taken to make them blend in with the rest of the construction, but…" she frowned suddenly and gave the room around her a thoughtful look, "…they are expensive. Too much so for the rest of the village."

"And it looked like someone was expanding," Blake said. "The part of the east wall I saw looked newer, less weathered, and the buildings near there don't look like they've been occupied yet."

"Huh. Well, I don't know if it means anything, but I'll put it in my report for—" Ruby broke off as her scroll began to squeal, followed a moment later by her teammates'. The 'distressed huntress' beacon was sounding and from the locator…it was right in front of the main gate!

"Let's go!"

Ruby felt a moment of thankfulness that she had insisted on weapon maintenance before they'd taken their baths and everyone had fully reloaded.

Men were assembling in the courtyard in front of the main gate.

"Officer Montenegro!" Ruby called, picking out a familiar face.

The man in question half-turned, spotted her, quickly turned back to a woman with fair skin and hair as white as Weiss' own, and spoke quickly for a moment before hurrying over.

"How did—"

"Distressed huntress beacon," Ruby said quickly. "What?" she half-waved at the cuirass-wearing men scrambling onto the platform high on the walls.

"The caravan is under attack by raiders, they hit just as it cleared the tree-line," he explained.

"What forces do you have?"

"Essentially none. The Watch is mostly a constabulary force. We employ huntsmen and huntresses to conduct local patrols to keep Grimm in check."

Ruby looked at her friends, "They aren't Grimm—"

"We're in," Yang said quickly.

Weiss gave a firm nod, her lips pressed into a line thinner than her scar.

"Blake?" Ruby asked.

Blake hesitated a moment longer before nodding.

Ruby pulled out her scroll. "Log verbal contract. Emergency short-form. Team Leader Huntress-in-Training Ruby Rose with Team RWBY of four out of Beacon Academy. Raider attack on supply caravan inbound Valentina."

She extended her scroll to Montenegro. "Uh, you do have authority to—"

"Allow me," the woman Montengro had been speaking to said. "Authorized, Watch Commander Blanche Fleur of Valentina."

The scroll beeped, and a moment later the screen flashed green.

"Contract logged," Ruby said. "Blake, go. I'll get up on the wall and provide cover fire until you get there, and then I'll link up."

A quick flash of her semblance and she was up on the rifle walk. She started to shift Crescent Rose but realized the town probably would prefer it if she didn't ding up their wall. Fortunately she had built her baby with a collapsing bipod (an admittedly seldom-used feature). Ruby swapped the magazine for one loaded with thunder-Dust rounds she'd come up with after RWBY and JNPR discussed semblances one afternoon. Nora wasn't present, but it was the closest thing to non-lethal she had.

The caravan was a dozen vehicles, the last just outside the tree-line. A pair of trees had been dropped to prevent them going back up the road, and the front vehicle had its front-tires suspended out over a pit that had come from somewhere. She tagged one raider, a second, a—

Ruby didn't know who her third target was. For one thing her face was concealed. But her weapon… Normally Ruby was proud of her ability to never forget a weapon.

As she came off the wall in a flurry of rose petals, swapping thunder for gravity-Dust rounds to give her maximum recoil, she hoped that this time she was wrong.

* * *

Taking the front of the caravan was easy. The raiders had trusted their little trap to disable the front-most truck, and so had left only three to secure it and the trucks immediately after. Two were now unconscious and securely trussed, and Weiss was handling the third,

A spurt of flame from somewhere singed her bow, so Blake reached up and yanked it off, wincing slightly as sparks bit at her skin and it tugged uncomfortably at her ears, as she considered her next action.

Most of the attention was on a woman in red armor who was fending off two huntsmen and a huntress by herself, and a Dust mage at the rear who was occupying most of the mundane guards. There were other raiders, but taking them out while worthwhile probably wouldn't relieve pressure on the others so…

"Weiss, can you counter that Dust mage?"

Weiss used Myrtenaster to pin her current opponent's (male, needed a shave, overly-long dirty blonde hair, and jacket with torn sleeves over long-sleeved gray shirt and a red bandana around the neck) gun—something bashed together out of at least three other weapons that her partner would no doubt be able to identify _and_ recite states for at a glance—to one side. Then her right flashed out as she caught him across the jaw.

She did _not_ curse, but she did flex her hand a few times. How did Xiao Long _do_ that all day?

Her opponent, only dazed, started to shake it off so this time she forcefully applied Myrtenaster's pommel to his forehead and this time he stayed down.

Opponent dealt with, she turned and looked down the length of the caravan.

There was a woman who looked to be in her thirties—it was hard to tell under the dirt. Below average height, dark hair clipped close to her scalp. And lightning was crackling non-stop, as a micro-tornado pelted the trucks and beleaguered defenders with sticks, stones, and the odd tree branch. Definitely a dust-mage even if she didn't know quite how the woman was pulling some of that off.

Perhaps a combination of water and wind with a careful addition of thunder…

"Weiss!"

"I don't know," Weiss ducked back behind the engine of the truck they were using for cover. "I can give it my best."

"It looks like they only have the one," Blake said. "We'll start with freezerburn. Yang, can you throw Weiss?"

"Sure."

" _What?_ "

"Okay. Weiss, Yang'll give you a throw, then you'll take Yang's place for bumblebee. That'll get you close. From there it's on you. Yang, we'll move right and try to cut our way to her."

"Got it."

Blake peeked again, ears twisting at the sound of combat. It sounded—

" _Now!_ "

Weiss took two bounding steps to clear the trucks and Myrtenaster flashed down as Yang ran up the side of the truck they'd been using for cover to gain height.

A low-lying fog bank swirled around them at the same time as a rapidly-firing cannon grew close.

Blake's eyes widened as rose petals swirled in the mist. "Abort. Action right. All three of us right now!"

* * *

Bless you, Blake, Ruby thought as a small fog bank—unmistakably freezer-burn—swirled out of nowhere despite the warmth of the day. She only had the two magazines of gravity-Dust and she swapped them on the fly as she spun through the fog and bounded down the tops of the trucks.

The dust mage should be right…there.

A skip. A hop. _Juuuuump…_

The woman grunted as Ruby's right shoulder caught her in the sternum and as both went tumbling for the ground, Ruby finished her spin to bright Crescent Rose around…

"Parlay!" she screamed as her knees bent to take the shock of landing. "Raven Branwen, I summon you to parlay!"

Ruby half-expected to be blasted off her feet, but the light-blue eyes of the dusky skinned woman beneath her widened at the name.

"Oh no," Yang muttered.

"Hold! All Branwens, hold."

"Hold," Blake echoed as the fighting around them abruptly died. "Caravan, Team RWBY, huntsmen, hold up for parlay. Yang. Talk to me. Who's Raven Branwen?"

Yang didn't reply for a long moment, then she spat in the dirt and jerked her arms so that Ember Celica once more folded into chunky bracelets. "My mother," she said darkly, walking down the length of the caravan.

Blake looked at Weiss.

"What are you looking at me for?"

Blake shook her head. "Let's go save our partners."

* * *

"If Raven hadn't called for us to hold, I would kill you where you stand."

"I know," Ruby said sadly at the woman lying on Crescent Rose' sblade. "Or suspected as much."

The woman sneered.

"That's why Crescent Rose is on a dead-girl trigger," She moved the snaith just enough so the woman could see her hand, with one finger firmly engaging the sniper-scythe's trigger. "There's enough gravity Dust in the chamber to pitch an Ursa over the Shieldwall. If I die…" Ruby looked up as a woman in red armor wearing a mask like a giant nevermore approached, "…so does your Dust-mage."

The woman said nothing for a long moment. Then she reached up and removed the mask. "You know my name, but I don't know yours."

Ruby nodded as face matched weapon. "Ruby Rose. Leader of Team RWBY."

"I suppose you enjoy that."

"Eh, sometimes?" Ruby asked.

"You asked for this parlay. Talk."

"Take your people and go home," Ruby said.

Raven snorted. "Why? We will crush you."

"You can try," Ruby agreed as her team came running up. "Stop there," she called over her shoulder. She turned back to Raven. "My team will stop you."

"You'll die in the trying," Raven stated. "The strong survive. The weak die."

"Charming philosophy," Weiss snarked.

"If that's what you think, why didn't you just kill me and be done with it?" Yang asked angrily. "Why walk away?"

"Yang!" Ruby said sharply. She looked back at her sister and Yang looked away, so both missed the expression that flickered across Raven's face. Ruby turned back. "You could. You'd probably be out a Dust mage. Weiss seems to think she's pretty good so she must be something special. That can't be a talent that's easy for you to replace."

This time she did see Raven's expression flicker.

"And I'm guessing you know _exactly_ who is on my team," Ruby said flatly. "I'm pretty sure that's attention you don't want. So…even if you kill us, you still lose. Because right now, no one in the Kingdoms really cares what happens outside it. But if you kill us, people will care. People with more strength than you."

Raven didn't speak for a time. Then she snorted contemptuously and put her mask back on. "You must think yourself very clever."

"Not so clever," Ruby said softly. "At best I'm getting a draw. If I was clever, I'd have found a way to get your tribe to…heal instead of hurt, and maybe put my family back together."

"You sound like Summer."

"Thank you," Ruby said brightly.

"It wasn't a complement."

Ruby cocked her head in consideration. "Nope!" she chirped.

"Excuse me?"

"Nope!" Ruby repeated happily. "It doesn't matter how you meant it. What matters is how I take it."

Raven reached up as though to rub her forehead and found her helmet. "Now you _really_ sound like Summer," she said disgustedly. "If you get my daughter killed, I _will_ kill you."

"Yang," Ruby said instead of replying. "I know you've been looking for a long time…"

Yang clenched her fists, looking first at her sister, then at the other raiders. "My questions will keep," she said gruffly. "I have a feeling this won't be the last time we meet."

Raven turned and walked away. "Branwens, to me!"

"Are you going to let me up?" the Dust-mage asked.

Ruby looked down. "Oh, oops? My bad." She released the trigger and stepped to one side.

"What happened to putting an Ursa over the Shieldwalls?" the woman asked as she stood.

"Safety," Ruby said, flicking a switch. "It disengages the firing pin rather than locking the trigger. Thanks to you I have a new modification to make."

"And that makes you…happy?"

"Tinkering with Crescent Rose?" Ruby asked. "Always!"

The woman managed to look almost as disgusted as Raven had sounded. "I never believed her stories about her former leader. Now I do."

"If it helps, there really is enough gravity Dust in the chamber to put an Ursa over the Shieldwalls," Ruby offered, exaggerating only slightly.

* * *

"Your mother," Weiss said to Yang as they walked with the trucks towards the gate of Velentina. She looked at Ruby. "But not yours?"

"As near as we can tell, Dad, Yang's mom—"

"Mother," Yang grated. "I lost Mom when you did."

" _Our_ mom—"

"Summer," Yang provided.

"And Uncle Qrow were all on the same team when _they_ were at Beacon," Ruby said. "They…never explained why Raven left, or where she'd gone, or…anything."

"Other than that she is really, really dangerous," Yang said. She started to say more, but broke off as the three hunters approached.

One huntsman carried the other on his back, and now that they had the chance to have a good look it was apparent they were twins, only the one being carried had dyed his hair a brilliant shade of red, while the one doing the carrying had dyed his silver.

"Thank you for that timely intervention," the huntsman leading them said, falling into step with them.

"No problem," Ruby said. "Team RWBY out of Beacon. I'm Ruby Rose. These are Weiss, Blake, and Yang."

The huntress cocked her head. "Does that ever get confusing?"

"You have no idea," Weiss said with a roll of her eyes.

"A'yep," Yang agreed.

Blake hummed.

"Sometimes," Ruby agreed cheerfully.

"These are Gules and Argent," the huntress replied, indicating first the red-haired twin, then his brother. "I'm Tyrone. And I must say, I'm impressed. You are…awfully young."

"Well, Weiss had never been camping so I asked for an easy patrol…"

"You mean this is your _first_ year?" Argent asked. "But term just started?"

"A…yep?" Ruby asked uncertainly.

"Doubly impressed," Tyrone said with a shake of his head.

"Uh…why?" Ruby asked.

"Most huntresses far older than you would have attacked. Perhaps with more skill than you have, but still a straight-up fight. You…identified where they were vulnerable, and then forced both sides to retire."

"Well…I was lucky. If Blake hadn't made the same call, and if Weiss and Yang hadn't set up that mist to screen me, that dust mage would have seen me coming and there's no way I could have taken her by surprise the way I did."

Tyrone shook his head. "Oh, luck had a part, certainly, and you should never rely on it. But you saw an opportunity that others would not and seized upon it. Your team trusted each other, and worked together, and when the situation changed, they adapted. A little humility is all well and good, it keeps your ego in check which is something far too many huntsmen and huntresses have a problem with, but do not be so eager to disparage your own accomplishments by ascribing them to…luck."

Blanche Fleur came jogging up. She started to address Ruby, but seeing Argent carrying Gules, paused. "Do you need medical assistance, sir?"

Gules laughed. "Twisted my ankle after it was over. This lout," he slapped Argent on the back of the head, "is being overprotective. It's nothing that a little rest and aura won't fix."

Ruby abruptly yawned. "Rest sounds good." She frowned, then added: "and food."

"I could eat again," Yang agreed.

"Are you never _not_ hungry?" Weiss asked. "Well, perhaps a light snack."

The Watch Commander smiled. "As a thank you for your services, the Mayor invites you to partake of the _onsen_ at no cost to yourselves."

* * *

"Ooooh _yeah!_ "

Weiss averted her eyes as her teammate's stretch lifted her…considerable assets above the surface of the water.

"Man," Yang said, sitting back, her head pillowed on her interlaced fingers, "this is great."

"You're shameless," Weiss huffed.

"What's shame ever gotten anyone?" Yang asked. "Certainly not this!"

"Yang…"

"And it's not like you don't have anything to be shameful about." Yang's expression turned into a happy leer. "The exercise is starting to pay off."

"Yang…"

"And the scenery is great," Yang continued, head tracking as two men only a few years older than they were passed by on their way to another pool, before flicking her eyes at the snow-capped mountains with flanks covered in the scarlet foliage of Forever Fall. "Isn't the scenery great, Blake?"

Blake, who had her head back on a stone and had her eyes closed, raised one fist marginally above the water and stuck her thumb out.

"Ruby, help?"

Ruby sniffed. "The water smells funny."

"Of _course_ it does you dolt," Weiss sighed. "I hate you all."

"Aww, don't be like that, Snowflake."

Weiss crossed her arms, glowering at Yang, whose smile turned into a grin. Weiss flushed from the heat—of _course_ it was!—and quickly lowered her arms once more. "No, Yang. I really do hate you."

"Oh, well, Blakey still loves me," Yang said, reaching for her partner's head. "Don't you, Kitten?"

Blake didn't so much as crack an eyelid. "Touch the ears and I will break your fingers, Xiao Long."

"And we're already up to threats of physical violence."

"Yang, dial it back."

"What?" Yang asked.

Ruby sighed and looked at her sister. "Dial it back."

"I'm not doing anything."

"Do you really want to have this conversation right now?" Ruby asked.

"What conversation?"

Ruby sighed. "You're upset from earlier, and you fall back on humor whenever you're upset. Usually that's fine, but this—" her hand broke the surface of the water and a finger swept a circle "—isn't normal."

"Isn't exactly normal for me either."

"Closer for you than us," Ruby said. "What? Did you seriously think I didn't know about your parties?"

"You know about them. _Dad_ knows about them—"

"The ones after Qrow got him taking missions again?" Ruby asked. "The ones where I was sleeping over at Cherry's?"

Yang's grin abruptly vanished as she sank up to her chin in the water. "You know about those."

"Yes."

"Why didn't you tell Dad?"

"Why should I have?" Ruby asked.

"Maybe because I was breaking the rules?" Yang asked sarcastically.

Ruby cocked her head to one side. "The rules were in place to keep us safe. You might have broken them, but you were never yourself unsafe. And you never put me in danger."

"One time I did."

"Sparring without Crescent Rose doesn't count."

"I wasn't thinking about that time," Yang muttered, her arms dropping down below the water.

"And now I've ruined the mood," Ruby sighed. "I didn't mean for that to happen."

"No?" Yang asked.

"Blake's ignoring you, and you weren't going to make the same jokes to me, were you?" Ruby asked. "Because that would be awkward."

Yang nodded slightly.

"It's not that I don't want you to have fun just…try to enjoy the adventure you have before seeking out the next one. And not everyone is as adventurous as you." Ruby paused. "And do we really have to be starkers in here?"

"Yes," Blake said.

"It is, apparently, a thing," Weiss said.

"Y'know, Ruby is right," Yang said slowly.

"She is?" Weiss asked.

"I am?" Ruby asked.

"We're four hot chicks with huntress-in-training licenses who just chased off the bad guys," Yang said. "We should be having fun."

"A book would be just about perfect," Blake said.

" _Ninjas of Love_?"

Blake slipped, her head half-disappearing under water before she caught herself and came up sputtering. "You… How long…"

"Blakey reads smut." Yang grinned.

"It's not smut," Blake said in a low voice. "Its literary merits are—"

"Blakey reads well-heeled smut."

Blake hid her face in her hands as the tips of her ears turned pink. "I hate you."

"You love me too."

"Unfortunately." Blake looked up. "I don't _only_ read—"

"Smut?"

"—erotic literature."

"As fascinating as Blake's taste in reading material is," Weiss interjected. "Who _was_ that leading the raiders?"

"We told you pretty much everything we know," Ruby said. "When our Dad was at Beacon he was on a team with our mothers. Yang's mom—"

"Summer was our Mom." After a moment Yang sighed and slumped back against the edge of the pool. "Mother left me with Dad just after I was born. No warning. Not even a letter, or—" she laughed bitterly "—not that I've been told about."

"And you just let her go?" Weiss asked. "Weren't you even curious?"

Yang flinched.

"It's not that simple," Yang said.

"Yang," Ruby interrupted. "You don't—"

"It's related," Yang said. "Yeah, Weiss, I was curious. _Am_ curious. There was a time I was…more than a little obsessed over it, actually. Pestered just about everyone I met. And when I found something, or rather, when I _thought_ I found something, I waited until Dad left, put Ruby in a little red wagon, and went off in search of answers.

"And I got there. Go me," Yang said sarcastically. "This little brat of a girl too exhausted to walk home, much less find her answers in the shack full of beowolves she'd marched herself and her sister into."

"Yang."

"You obviously survived," Blake said.

Yang slumped back against the stones. "Not because of anything I did, Blake. Uncle Qrow decided to come visit, found the house deserted, and tracked us. Got there just in time to save us from my…obsession.

"So yeah, Weiss. I'm curious. And yeah, I let her go. Ruby won. Trying to drag it out wasn't going to make things better. And maybe I have the right to take chances with my life. But I also had a team that counted on me, and a caravan and civilians in town that were relying on me, and I don't have the right to take chances with their lives."

Ruby moved over to lean against Yang, resting her head on her sister's shoulder. "You know I forgave you a long time ago, don't you?"

"Yeah," Yang said. "I'm still trying to forgive me though, okay?"

Ruby pulled away and gave her a solemn look. "As long as you _are_ working towards that."

"Well," Weiss said after a pause. "If you ever get your chance, ask her about that Dust-mage for me. She was doing things I'd never heard of before."

"Pardon. Are you Ruby?"

Ruby looked up at a giant bear of a man—faunus, she corrected herself—with bear ears, thick brown hair and matching beard.

"Yes, I am," she said. "And we are. Team RWBY, that is."

"Can I join you for a moment?"

"I guess?" Ruby asked awkwardly.

"Excellent." He came down the ramp, turned to steady himself on the wall, and by the time he turned back he was in water up to his chest and was folding the towel to balance on top of his head. "Salmon Fischer," he said.

"You're joking," Yang grinned.

"He's not."

Ruby and Yang looked at Weiss and Blake in surprise.

Weiss' tone was well south of 'icy', and her posture was one they recognized as being a step and a half from violence. Considering that they had neither weapons nor Dust, and that the water would significantly impede Yang's ability to fight and Ruby's ability to run and retrieve said weapons and Dust, her glyphs were their most readily accessible offensive capability.

Blake, however, just looked…cautious. Which was about normal, except she was eyeing exits, and her ears had slid back.

But then Weiss took a breath. "Considering that I am not currently employed by, and Team RWBY is not contracted to, the Schnee Dust Company, I feel neither obligated nor compelled to report to them of your presence here…Mr. Fischer."

Ruby wasn't sure if Weiss was more surprised at that statement, or Blake. Fischer managed to keep his reaction to a raised eyebrow. "Thank you, Ms. Schnee."

Weiss nodded shortly.

"Uh…story?"

"A year and a half ago there was a White Fang…attack on an SDC mining site during an inspection tour by a junior vice president," Weiss said slowly. "The VP and his retinue, and much of the guard force were killed. The majority of the workers and their families…chose to end their employment with the SDC and…not give due notice. Grimm attacked shortly thereafter, and killed those that had stayed. There was…significant damage to both the housing encampment as well as the mine proper. Significant enough that not all of the mining equipment could be accounted for."

"Probably lost when the mine blew out," Fischer said emotionlessly.

"Probably," Weiss echoed.

"Well that explains how Weiss knows him," Yang said cheerfully. "What about you, Blake?"

"I was working with a resettlement team out of Menagerie," Blake said evenly. Then she shook her head and turned to Fischer. "I didn't know you ended up here, though."

"Heard about this Mistrali-style _onsen_ outside of Vale, on the back side of the Shieldwalls," Fischer said. "I was appreciating that there were other cultures than Dust mine camps so I did a little research and found _onsen_ are usually situated on top of a geothermal hot-spot. And that's a damn odd thing to have in the Shieldwalls."

"Dust?" Weiss asked, the slight rise in pitch on the end of the word making it both a question and betraying her sudden intent interest.

"We've found where someone dug at least a half-dozen exploration shafts," Fischer agreed. "Andthe spall for a good-size gallery, though we haven't found the entrance to that yet."

Ruby breathed a sigh of relief as Weiss slowly relaxed her posture, but when she spoke next it was in a guarded tone.

"The veins must be rich indeed for Valentina to expand on little more than speculation."

"Valentina has invested heavily in us, and in our mutual future," Fischer agreed. "Your actions today…saved that future. This is the third time we've tried to get that equipment through. Replacing it, well, it would have bankrupted us. Both in lien, and in goodwill."

"It's what we do," Ruby said. "Being Huntresses, I mean."

Fischer nodded. "The Mayor assured me that she is satisfied that the short-form contract will be adjudicated fairly. I'd offer something as well, but aside from our gratitude we really have nothing else to offer at this time. However, I'd like to place Beacon on retainer, with your team as Primary."

"That's very generous."

Fischer smiled then. "Not so generous. As I said, we don't really have anything."

"Yet," Weiss noted.

"Yet," Fischer agreed.

"Mr. Fischer," Weiss began.

"Please, just Fischer. Or Sam."

"Fischer," Weiss said. "We can't speak for the Headmaster, of course, but I'm sure we'd be happy to accept if approved." She continued as though the agreement of the rest of RWBY was a forgone conclusion. Which it was, of course. "Do you have a processing and distribution network?"

Fischer hesitated. "There is always a market for high-quality Dust…"

"No, then," Weiss said. "I know some people, if I can have your contact info to pass along?"

"Not SDC. No offense."

Was that a smile? Ruby wondered as Weiss' lips twitched. No, of course it wasn't.

"If you insist," Weiss said after a moment. "I can check SDC's list of blackballed processors and retailers if you want."

Fischer choked. "Uh, yes, thank you. That'd be…very nice."

* * *

 _This was not part of the plan_.

"No, it wasn't," you agree.

 _Why are we are going off-script then?_

"I destroy my enemy when I make him my friend."

 _You're insane_.

"So sayeth the voice in my head?"

It's pretty clear that you are in one of your moods and simply talking isn't going to divert you so I take a moment to consider my next line of reasoning. _We'd agreed that the White Fang are far from the biggest threat_.

"We did," you reply. "But they are still _a_ threat. One we can use if we can turn them to our cause."

 _Or split them in a civil war. How well do you think that's going to turn out? For everyone?_

"That's what I'm hoping to avoid."

 _It didn't last time_.

"Last time Adam had a chance to maneuver his supporters into position."

 _Exactly. Even that didn't stop any internal fighting, but it was short, swift, and didn't really touch civilians_.

"And gave him total control of the White Fang. How did that turn out again?"

 _Are you going to go after the Branwens next?_ I ask.

"Don't be ridiculous."

 _I'm not. If you're changing the plan_ —

"Not to that extent. I could take most of them. But a Maiden? The _Spring_ Maiden? For us to have any shot at winning I'd need to totally cut loose and if I did it'd blow any chance of my staying in the shadows.

"I only have the freedom to maneuver independently so long as Salem never realizes I'm on the board."

 _And yet you reveal yourself to one of her pieces_.

"We were never certain that she was one of Salem's pieces."

 _You don't know that she isn't either. Or that one of her people might report you. Or that she might mention you to Adam and_ he _reports you_ …

"And the reward?" you murmur. "Even if it devolves into a civil war… I can't believe you are arguing against this, Amy?"

And I don't really have anything to say to that. This plan of yours is almost straight out of my old playbook. But then, my playbook got me riding around in the back of your head.

Finding the White Fang's current HQ hadn't exactly been easy, but it wasn't particularly hard either. You still have the limitations of organic memory, but mine is virtual. It was a straightforward data-dump to pull up a list of known safehouses. Filter out those that weren't in Mistral and hadn't been put into use after the fall of Beacon. A fair number of people would need to be able to come and go. Space, both for operations and because operatives would need a safe place to relax and not all of them could travel to Menagerie (or be seen traveling to Menagerie for that matter). For that matter, space to train and store supplies would be nice. It'd run the risk of losing a lot of material if the location was compromised but…

Mistral had more cleared area than any of the other Kingdoms. There was enough area that those with obscene levels of wealth could and did have 'country estates.' And one of them the White Fang had been 'gifted' many years before. Or rather, it had been gifted to Ghira Belladonna and he'd used it as an occasional meeting site and R&R facility, and he'd left it to the White Fang's use when he'd 'retired' to Menagerie.

Infiltrating it should have been harder. But then, the White Fang—or at least Sienna Khan—knew that they didn't really have the capability to fend off a true military assault, or a strike team of huntsmen. It was quickly apparent that they hadn't tried either. Their security was good to stop anything less—or close enough to not make a difference—and for that matter was probably good enough that without me riding around in the back of your head and all the other assorted nastiness tucked away in your body you'd have probably been detected anyway.

Which is how you are sitting in Sienna Khan's personal lounge when she comes in and comes to a crashing stop.

You stand and offer a polite bow. "Sienna Khan."

"You know my name. I don't know yours," she replies. Average height and build, strong alto voice, dark-skinned with striped tattoos running up her arms accenting her tiger-ears, and darker hair cut into an asymmetrical pixie cut that frames yellow eyes. Her clothes are black, accented with red, a red cape at her shoulders, and gold hoops through her lower ears, while a pair of hoops decorate her left tiger-ear.

"Vala bar-Adama."

"You weren't born with that name."

"Were you born with yours?"

"Yes, actually."

Huh. "I didn't know that," you admit. "And no, it isn't the name my parents gave me. It is, however, the name I have chosen for myself." Which is true enough…now. But then it'd be pretty difficult to use your actual birth name, wouldn't it?

She's still staring at you.

"I believe this is the point where refreshments are usually offered?"

"Refreshments are for guests," she replies in a low voice.

"I thought of knocking on your front door, but decided that it was more likely to provoke your guards to precipitate some unfortunate action."

"Do tell."

"They would try to subdue me, I'd decline. They'd try to kill me, and I'd object. You'd either attack me or your guards would bundle you off… Now, I'd like to think I'm pretty good, but I estimate our chances of being able to talk under those circumstances to be…less than good."

"I don't think we have anything to talk about," she says flatly.

"No?"

"What would I have to talk to a—you, about?"

"Why don't you finish that first thought," you suggest. "A human? A huntress? A professor at Beacon Academy? I can think of several reasons you might want to talk to any one of the three."

"I can't." Her reply is flat, not quite cold.

"Okay. Why don't I tell you why I want to talk to you?"

She shrugs slightly rather than telling you to leave again which has to be a step in the right direction.

"I was talking to a student why she wanted to become a huntress. She told me that she had to make a difference and that what she was doing before wasn't working."

"Touching."

"Her name is Blake Belladonna."

And _that_ got a reaction. "Blake?" The sudden question, the tilt of her ears, the pitch of her voice tells you that she knows, or at least knows of, Blake far better than you ever suspected.

"Adam didn't tell you that she left the White Fang?"

She doesn't reply, instead prowling around the room with a powerful, silky, gliding stride that matches her ears and tattoos quite wonderfully. She stops at a cabinet and from it produces glasses and a dark bottle. She draws the cork, pours, and crosses back to you with that same stride.

You wait for her to sit on the floor, Mistrali-fashion in front of a low table, before sitting yourself opposite her.

"Is she still wearing that ridiculous bow?"

The tone was warmer, more personable, but the question was about the last thing you expected her to ask.

"Yes," you reply.

Sienna inhales sharply. "I suppose that's not surprising."

You sip the wine. Very nice. And then set it down on the table. "My understanding was she started wearing it when your organization began…divesting itself of its human membership." You'd taken some time to read what was available on the White Fang to reacquaint yourself of just when in their timeline you were. At one point it'd been a registered non-profit organization in all four kingdoms with not insignificant, though very much minority, human participation.

"I meant that she would continue wearing it, given the rampant speciesism at the huntsmen academies."

"Not at Beacon. Not among the teachers."

"You persist in allowing it."

You nod slightly. "A point. Do you know why?"

"Does it matter?"

"Perhaps not to you, or to me, but potentially for my students," you reply. She doesn't respond so you take a sip of wine before continuing. "The Creatures of Grimm do not care. If you end up against something beyond you, you die. Potentially civilians die. Certain emotions, hurt, despair, draw Grimm. Being able to deal with, and control, both is essential for my student's long-term survival."

"How is being able to deal with odds against you supposed to help?" she does not, quite, scoff at you.

"You don't think it would benefit my students to be able to recognize a threat they are unable to defeat?" You reply.

She nods slightly. "A point."

"Self-reliance will only take you so far. At some point it is insufficient to be able to say, 'I cannot deal with that threat.' At some point it is essential to be able to say 'I must ask for help.' That is, perhaps unsurprisingly, something that most teenagers struggle with."

"You set them up to fail."

"Not hardly. It is also why they have partners, and are assigned teams. Most of which—I am speaking of bullying in general, you understand—successfully intervene without needing to involve a teacher."

"And those that don't?" she asks.

"Are predominantly faunus," you admit, "which is one of my reasons for seeking you out. I'm not certain if it's an artifact of species, culture, or society, and would like some ideas on how to handle it."

 _Did you really just ask her for advice on how to stop bullying?_ I demand.

'Why not?'

 _You… You dolt!_

' _That_ is your response?'

 _Tell me I'm wrong_.

"You could step on it the next time you see it," Sienna says with a bare-toothed expression.

You shrug. "Unless someone specifically asks me to intervene, or it steps past the bounds to the point of inflicting physical injury, becoming a danger to Beacon, or risking civilian lives, I can't."

"So, what, they should attack their tormentors, Professor?"

"Vala, please."

She clenches her fist and for a moment you're left wondering if she's going to jump across and tear out your throat with her teeth. "Then I am Sienna. For now."

You nod. "Yes, Sienna. That is exactly what they should do. Beacon is a _Huntsman_ Academy. The job puts a premium on violence, and unless an aura is driven past the red zone it is unlikely that physical injury will occur."

"And if your problem student does that, then what? The human goes to the civil authorities."

"And accomplishes what?" you reply. "Beacon Academy isn't part of the City of Vale. Their courts would laugh at anyone who tried. I suppose they could try lodging a complaint with the Council thought I'm not sure to what end. No Kingdom laws would have been broken, and the Council cannot compel the Headmasters to accept, or expel, any student."

"They have ways to apply pressure."

"I don't doubt that they do. What I doubt is that they'd care. Against the needs of running a Kingdom, dealing with an assault—one supported by school policy—at Beacon would be lost in the paperwork."

"Then I have no advice to offer except that you better educate your students, and whatever steps you do take, be seen taking them." She sipped her wine. "What shall we talk about next…Vala?"

"Unintended consequences."

"Oh?"

"I won't argue the merits of civil disobedience compared to a more…strenuous effort to defend oneself," you say. "But proactive measures should be carefully weighed and considered before being implemented. Not only for the outcomes desired, but for the outfall that might not be."

"That sounded remarkably like a threat," she observes.

You smile thinly. "It wasn't. It was simply an observation that once events have been placed in motion it becomes very difficult to influence them. Sometimes in shifting a pebble, you can trigger an avalanche."

"True. Do you have something specific in mind?"

"Only that with a vigorous defensive posture your actions will clearly be self-defense. That won't sway the portion who will never agree with you anyway, nor matter to those who would agree with you even if you told them the sky was green, but those in the middle who are undecided or neutral? That is a different story.

"The problems with a more…proactive stance are legion."

"Do tell."

You consider you glass of wine. It really is quite good.

"What is it that you want, Sienna?"

"What is it that you want, Vala?"

"World peace is probably too much to ask for."

"Most likely."

"Very well," you say. "I want the Kingdoms to keep existing. And not because I'm particularly enamored with them, I'm not. I want to avert a war. Not because I find it an abhorrent waste, at best, though I do. I want peaceful civilization to flourish although I would, quite honestly, find it dreadfully dull. And I want all those things because it is far better for me to live a dull existence in a place I don't particularly like than to have to deal with Grimm coming down out of the Shieldwalls because someone provoked a war."

"A war with humanity is the last thing I want," Sienna says.

"Do tell."

Instead Sienna gets up and paces around the room.

 _She really needs a tail to lash properly_ , I note.

'Shut up.'

"The Revolution was little better than an extended series of skirmishes punctuated by a few true battles, and perpetrated by one Kingdom. A war with humanity would drag in all four kingdoms, with their fair greater resources and numbers, against the faunus." She returns with the wine and pours.

"What is it you want, Sienna."

"I want humanity knows to know that we demand respect." She glares at her wine. "Most days I'm willing to settle for humanity fearing us."

"Fear isn't respect. Not really. An…appreciation for what you are capable of, perhaps. Perhaps that is close enough. But once people fear you, you can never afford to let them not fear you, but you also can't let them fear you so much that they hate you. If either of those happen, you'll be in humanity's shoes dealing with their version of the White Fang. Assuming that they don't just kick off that war you don't want, of course."

"I have no intention of taking it that far."

"Ah, but will they know that?" you ask. "If they do, can they trust that knowledge?"

She scowls at you.

"Unintended consequences," you note. "The other problem, of course, is one of numbers. As you noted in the war scenario, humanity outnumbers faunus. There are enough of them that you only need to make a very tiny percentage of them fear you to still have a _huge_ number of people living in fear. And fear brings Grimm.

"Grimm are a threat that every huntress and huntsman knows very well indeed. If you draw enough fear to one place, it won't matter what natural barriers you have or military strength. You'll have fliers coming over the mountains and chargers hitting the fixed defenses in numbers not seen since before the Great War."

"You would have us do nothing?"

"Not hardly. I am a huntress, Sienna. I'm not perfect. Far from it, actually. But it is a duty I take very seriously. Anything that supports a reduction in bigotry and hate I'm in support of. Just like I support anything that spreads joy and goodwill."

You stand. "I think it is probably time for me to go, before this conversation turns to things that would be better left unsaid at this juncture."

"That is probably a wise idea," Sienna says neutrally as she stands.

"The wine was excellent," You offer.

"Thank you."

 _Awww-kward~_

You reach into a belt pouch and pull out a small metal medallion. "My token," you say. "For future reference."

She frowns at you.

"A personal gift to Sienna Khan. Not the leader of the White Fang."

After a moment she nods and taken the token.

"I'll just show myself out," you reply, heading for the door.

The guards don't notice you, and you nip around the corner in time to hear Sienna's door open.

"Was anyone past here in the last half-minute?"

"Uh, no, High Leader."

There was a pause. "Put this facility on lockdown, and then I want a fully security sweep conducted."

 _You enjoyed that too much_ , I mutter as you walk—skip, really, if only mentally—down the lane past the gate.

'Did I?' you ask grinning.


	13. Volume 1 Chapter 11: learning curve

**Disclaimer:** Would it surprise anyone reading this to find out that I do not own RWBY?

On a side note, I have a couple of chapters sitting on my computer that I realize I haven't uploaded. I'll try for one a week until I'm caught up.

* * *

"I'm not sure if it is that girl, or if the whole team has insisted on over-achieving," Goodwitch said.

"Team RWBY—"

"Beginner's luck, Ozpin," Glynda said simply.

"Luck maybe," you agree. "But not the kind that comes from inability. Or, for that matter, holding back because you understand your abilities all too well."

"Indeed," Ozpin said. "Team RWBY is certainly above average in talent, and likewise lacking in restraint."

"Restraint is just what they need!"

You nod, because like it or not Goodwitch has a solid point.

"Perhaps," Ozpin said. "But there are many kinds of restraint. Holding back because of fear, or out concern for what your abilities can do, for example, is more hindrance than help."

"Ozpin, Ruby Rose tried to bluff _Raven Branwen_."

"By all accounts, she succeeded."

"If Branwen was bluffed at all, it was only because she allowed herself to be," you say. "But in all honesty, it doesn't matter."

"How do you reach _that_ conclusion, might I ask?" Goodwitch asks in a poisonously polite tone.

"Team RWBY's…let's call them 'issues' and move on, are not a matter of lack of talent, inadequate skill, or even a failure in leadership. What they lack, and restraint is only part of it, is experience. They're teenagers, and huntresses in training. The only way they'll outgrow those shortcomings is through experience. There's a lot we can do to reduce risk, but if we make it _safe_ the only outcome is that they won't be able to accurately gauge degree of risk once they graduate and are on real missions."

"Exactly so," Ozpin said.

"There's a difference between balancing risk management with learning opportunities and placing a first-year team against the Branwen tribe!" Glynda railed against Ozpin. "Do either of you believe the outcome wouldn't be different if it had been a team that didn't have two daughters from Team STRQ, including her own?"

"Also a point," you concede. "Actually, it's a good one. I thought the Branwen tribe hung out by Mistral. Aren't they getting a little far afield?"

Glynda looks at you. Fury quickly eroded by the puzzle you've thrown out. "You think someone put them up to it?"

"I think it needs to be considered. Was the contract settled?"

"Yes," Goodwitch said.

"And?"

"Team RWBY's payout was substantial."

"Good for them," you say.

Ozpin hummed softly.

"You perceive that to be a problem?" you ask.

"There have been students in the past who have drawn the wrong conclusions when they suddenly find themselves possessing what is, to them, a windfall," Ozpin said.

Not really an issue for you since your team hadn't made it to second year, much less ever really had a chance to bask in their well-deserved gains. But you can see where teenagers might draw the wrong conclusions but—

"If it was just Yang, or maybe her and Ruby I could see that," you say. "Blake might have lived roughly by choice, but she also has access to a rather comfortable lifestyle if she so chose. Better still, she is far better traveled than any three other students in her year. If anyone truly understands the value of lien and the necessity of planning for the future it is her. Furthermore, it is my understanding that Team RWBY has Weiss overseeing their finances, and _she_ is hardly one to let a handful of zeroes go to her head."

"There you may have a point," Ozpin said.

"It is a _very_ nice handful of zeros," Glynda says dryly.

"Well," Ozpin says, "that kind of thing is to be expected when you manage to run into the Branwen tribe…and survive."

"Meaning death benefits are cheaper?" you ask.

"Only because the insurance companies will put it down to creeps or other low-key threat to avoid the danger modifier if there are no witnesses to gainsay them."

"Isn't it a lovely world we live you?" you ask sarcastically. "Are you going to take them up on their offer of retainer?"

"I'm considering it," Ozpin said. "Helping to drive another wedge into the cracks beneath the SDC's near-monopoly is not without benefit. But without refiners or a distribution network, such benefits are likely to be little more than ephemeral."

"Heh. As it just so I happens I know a guy who was big into formulation. Want to bet that he came hum the tune for processing and knows someone in the distribution sector?"

* * *

As much as you want to call Flattery and Slater and begin discussing the expansion of your new business enterprise, there is that pesky little thing called a 'job.'

Yang parties hard, and craves a life of adventure. But her heart is also about three sizes too large, which is why it makes a certain, albeit twisted, sense that her mind-body interface is that of her home on Patch.

"Pretty good, huh?" Yang asks. She's sitting on the couch in your office, looking up at you as you made iced tea.

It wasn't. Not really. Oh, it had _looked_ nice enough. But the flowers were two dimensional. The log walls were flat and textureless. And the doors had no differentiation from the walls other than their appearance.

"The interface is foundational," you say instead. "In time you won't need it unless you need to do major work. Even minor injuries would heal more or less automatically. For the now, any injury you take will be reflected in the interface. This means you will be able to channel your energies into repairing your body much more quickly, efficiently, and completely than even a person with an activated aura could."

"Healing's a secondary benefit to having an activated aura. Something that only comes in handy if you let your aura get fully depleted. Why not skip—"

"Because it's pointless," you cut her off, setting the glasses of tea down on the table in front of the couch. "Until you can understand how to do this, you will be unable to do anything else I might teach."

"But—"

You lash out and break her nose.

For a moment Yang is so surprised she can only stare up at you. Then she comes out of her seat in a red-eyed tornado and you shove a full box of facial tissue into her gut and drop her back into her seat.

"Fix it!" you snap at her.

She glares up at you. "'Oo broge maa node!"

"If any of you had taken a blow in the forest you'd be concerned about a lot more than a broken nose," you tell her coldly. "I didn't even put any energy into hitting you. All it'd take is one beowolf and there'd be one less member of Team RWBY. And don't get me started on the Branwens."

Her eyes drift back to lilac as she rips a tissue from the box and holds it to her nose.

"Starting to finally sink in just how vulnerable you all are right now?" you ask, and she looks away. Okay, time for something constructive. "Go into your interface and fix the damage. Or tonight you pack up and go home."

For a moment you'd have given even odds that you're about to have a drag-out fight in your office. But then the moment is gone and her lilac eyes flutter close. After about a minute as the tissue in her hand grows increasingly stained with red you can feel her aura begin to sluggishly respond.

You reach over to provide a little additional guidance, and almost reflexively find yourself following Yang back inside her interface. It's probably—no, _definitely_ —not a good sign. Either she is so consumed by what she's doing that her entire being literally did not notice your invasion. Or…something. You aren't sure you want to know what.

Yang is standing next to the facsimile of her home, beside a window, taking a step back as though to examine her repair. She notices you approaching and hands you a broken pane.

It is split on the diagonal and certainly looks like glass. But it doesn't feel like glass. It feels like…nothing, actually. It makes no sound when you touch the pieces together. It has no mass.

"Watch," you say. You put energy into the glass. A serious no-no. This is _Yang_ 's place, but the others have this down. Not completely. Not even close. But they have it down enough that most of the work on getting it right is simply a matter of time and effort and experience.

You fit the two pieces together, melding them into a single pane. It acquires depth. Mass. Substance. The surface feels cool and slick. Instead of a generic look, like you might see in a painting of a window pane, it becomes transparent and reflective. You tap your fingers against it and your nails make a tinkling 'plink'.

Yang is watching you, and after a moment longer you pass it to her. "This is real," she says after a time. You take the glass plate away from her and reabsorb the energy in it until it fades away.

"This is real," you reply, taping at the replacement pane that was her repair. Unsurprisingly it creates no sound. "The problem is you built an edifice. You can engage it with your eyes and it looks nice enough. But the walls don't feel like logs. You can't smell the flowers. If you walk barefoot you can't feel the grass between your toes, or taste the water in the bucket.

"Fix it again," you say, gesturing towards the window. "This time, fix it right. Don't just make it look right. Make it sound right. Make it feel right. Close your eyes and use your other senses. Make it what you want it to be."

Your sudden and forceful ejection from Yang's mind is an unexpected but pleasant surprise.

 _Objective complete_ , I whisper.

You chuckle, though only because Yang is too deep in her head to notice. You sip your tea, then reach over for the box of tissues and clean Yang up.

Yang's eyes lazily blinked open, then she yawned hugely. "Man, I feel wiped."

"To be expected," you say, offering her the glass of tea which she promptly drains. "You just experienced a rather major shift in perspective."

"I don't remember Ruby or the others being this tired though," Yang said.

"You chose a rather different methodology than they did. You created an image, and now need to give that image depth. I suppose you could liken it to repairing an injury. That isn't to say that you are injured, you aren't. But the way you are drawing on your body's innate resources is similar, and any person has only so much energy to spare.

"They, well, Ruby and Weiss at least, chose a more traditional approach and focused on making a small area—something they could later expand on—as real as they could. Expansion, especially at their present pace, will take less energy on a day-to-day basis, but at the same time you have the equivalent of a sketch of the image you wish to paint and they do not.

"You might try an experiment. Finish the exterior work first. Leave the interior blank. When you do go inside, instead of creating an image and filling it out, try using their technique of perfecting one piece before moving on to the next."

"I'll think about it," Yang said neutrally, then yawned again. "In like, ten or twenty years. What about Blake? You mentioned Ruby and Weiss," she added.

"Blake has…chosen a technique I have never considered before. From an integration standpoint it presents no barrier, but it should be interesting to see where it takes her."

Yang nodded slowly. "This isn't a short-term thing, is it?"

"No, Yang. It is not. It will, in time, become less and less of an every-day activity, but you will be making improvements—or perhaps merely changes—for the rest of your life. Don't be disturbed if what…feels right does not match your expectations. What you have now may have very little in common—if anything in common at all—with what you have in the future. I doubt that if the person I was when I first began exploring these techniques would recognize anything of my interface today."

"Right." Yang rose, catching the arm-rest and steadying herself before she could go crashing back to the seat. "I, uh…" she yawned again. "I think I'm gonna go take a nap…"

Good. That left plenty of time for you to plan Weiss' next little lesson.

* * *

Ruby poked her head out from under the sheet swayed around her bed. "What was that?" she asked.

Weiss made a sound similar to that made by a dying ursa. "I asked if you could spare a moment regarding the assignment _Professor_ bar-Adama gave me."

"Is _Weiss Schnee_ asking me for help with school work?" Ruby asked brightly.

"Yes she— _I_ am!" Weiss snarled.

"Let me think. Um…okay!" Ruby said cheerfully as she swung the sheet up. Her movements set the bed to swaying gently and she patted the mattress next to her. "Hop on up."

"I most certainly will not!"

Ruby pouted for a moment, then shrugged and hopped down which made the bed sway even more. "Fine, be that way." A few petals drifted to the ground. "Well?" she asked from the desk chair she had sat in.

Weiss rolled her eyes, crossed the intervening space, and set her multi-action Dust rapier on top of the work area.

"So…what's the assignment?"

"I need to design a fix for Myrtenaster."

"Fix it?" Ruby asked.

Weiss shrugged.

"Uh… It looks in good repair," Ruby said. "How'd you settle on the rapier?"

"It matched the style I wanted to learn," Weiss said with a shrug.

Ruby looked at her askance. "You mean you picked your weapon _and_ your style without trying _either_?"

"Of course."

"Ooooo-kay," Ruby said slowly. "That's, um…that's not even the complete opposite of how everyone else does it but…. Ooookay," she said again.

"How does everyone else do it?"

"Usually they try different things until they find something that works for them," Ruby said vaguely. "You mean you designed Myrtenaster before you ever started fencing?"

"Of course not."

Ruby sighed in relief.

"It was designed and made for me."

Ruby stiffened and gave the sword a wary look, much like one would a particularly venomous snake, or perhaps a Grimm one had not seen before.

"It was made for you."

"Yes, by one of the SDC's greatest engineers," Weiss said proudly. She deflated with a heavy sigh. "H-his name was Vert Angstrom. Father fired him after…"

"Er…what?" Ruby asked.

"Father didn't want me to be a Huntress," Weiss said. "There were…reasons. One of them is why _I'm_ the Schnee heiress and not my older sister Winter."

Ruby nodded, distracted from the weapon on the desk. She dearly wanted to ask what those reasons were, but wasn't going to interrupt Weiss in 'sharing mode'.

"And if I were to go to any Academy he wanted it to be Atlas for…reasons. And I wanted to go to Beacon."

"For reasons?" Ruby asked.

"Of course." Weiss sniffed. "I made an argument, a good one, so he…acquiesced. But Vert helped me go behind his back and Father couldn't let that stand so he fired him. I…I didn't tell him, Ruby. I was afraid he might stop or…"

"What happened?" Ruby asked carefully.

Weiss looked away. "Father blackballed him. He…he found another company, eventually, one that didn't care. It's smaller, and doesn't have the pay or benefits the SDC offered, but he's free to take on projects he couldn't in the SDC.

"So," she said briskly. "Myrtenaster. She said I needed to design a fix for its weaknesses."

"Right," Ruby said. "That's a bit simpler."

"It is?"

"Not easy," Ruby agreed with a nod. "But simpler."

"Of course, they are," Weiss sighed.

"As I see it, there are two weaknesses. One is physical. The other is Aura."

"Aura."

"All of our tools and equipment—"

"—are conduits aura," Weiss said. "I did receive prefatory instruction, thank you."

" _Weapons_ ," Ruby went on, "are an _extension_ of our aura."

"Ruby," Weiss said very, _very_ slowly.

"Yes, Weiss?"

"Weapons aren't alive," Weiss said with forced patience. "Ergo, they don't have souls. Ergo, they don't have aura."

"I didn't say they have their _own_ aura," Ruby said calmly. "I said that they are an extension of _our_ aura."

"That makes no sense."

Ruby sighed. "Okay, we'll start at the beginning." She went to her bed, climbed up, and hopped down a moment later with Crescent Rose.

"Do I even want to know why your weapon was in bed with you?" Weiss asked.

"Um…no?" Ruby asked, then she shrugged and walked to the other desk and put the collapsed sniper-scythe on it. "Come over here and touch Crescent Rose."

"That sounds like something Yang would say," Weiss said as she reluctantly crossed the room. She touched the weapon with the tip of a finger. "Now what?"

Ruby grabbed her partner's wrist impatiently and pressed Weiss' hand flat against Crescent Rose. "Now reach out with your aura."

"But—"

"Do it!" Ruby barked.

"I feel you," Weiss said impatiently.

"From the other side of the room?" Ruby asked.

Weiss scowled at the drifting rose petals. "Yes, from the other—" she stopped abruptly. Looked at Ruby, and then looked at Crescent Rose which _felt_ like Ruby. She jerked her hand away as though stung. "What was that?" she asked, unable—and not caring—to hide the shock in her voice.

"That," Ruby said pointedly, "is Crescent Rose."

"You…your aura's so thick on it I thought I'd choke," Weiss said. "What'd you do? Pour yourself into it?"

"Essentially," Rose said. "It makes her more than just a combination scythe and sniper rifle. It makes her a part of me. And because she is, my aura helps protect her from harm, and it makes her blade sharper, and I don't need to compute trajectories or stuff when I use her to launch myself into the air. Well, not any more than you or Blake or Yang would need to when jumping with your own legs. Glyphs, shadow-clones, whatever."

"Because she is a part of you."

"Yes."

"Because you made her yourself."

"Yes."

"When you were twelve?" Weiss giggled.

"Thirteen, actually, but—"

"And you honestly expect me to believe at thirteen you were able to make _that_."

Ruby took a deep breath, biting back an angry retort as she stroked Crescent Rose's casing. "Pyrrha has been competing for four years with the same weapons. One that has more forms, and transitions a heck of a lot faster than Crescent Rose does."

"Jaune didn't forge Crocea Mors."

Ruby nodded slightly. "There are three, well, four I suppose, types of weapons that huntresses use. By far the most common are those they make themselves. The majority will consult a master armorer about design, material, ask them to oversee construction—I certainly did with Crescent Rose. Maybe some will commission ancillary gear, especially if they can't make it on their own for whatever reason. But most of the actual physical work they will do themselves.

"The second type are created by master aura smiths. They are a weapon smith of high caliber who can use their own aura to enhance the weapon they create—which reminds me, I need to ask Professor bar-Adama how what we're learning to do with aura extends to weapons, healing and all the other…out of body stuff. The weapons are often physically better than what most huntresses can make because the aura-smith has in the time learning to physically make masterwork weapons _without_ aura. But the weakness is that it isn't _your_ aura that went into it. It won't fit a huntress quite as well as their own work, but it retains enough of…itself that a huntress can channel her own aura into it.

"The third type are like Crocea Mors, legacy weapons handed down, mostly within a family. I'd think that they'd start out as one of the first two and, well, I guess it might not really be necessary. In fact, it might be a hindrance because the maker's aura would consider other auras, I don't know, a disease or something. Anyway, each wielder leaves their own mark, their own imprint on the sword. That age and blending of auras gives it…something that no new weapon will ever possess.

"I've felt that thing, Weiss, a lot more deeply than you have. Probably a lot more than Jaune has. Crocea Mors is very, very old. Even for a legacy weapon it is ancient, and it is very, very scary. I'd be surprised if a master aura smith _didn't_ make it somewhere back in the dusty annals of time. But that sword has been passed from father to son and mother to daughter for a _lot_ of generations. It's...I don't know what it is, and part of me hopes that Jaune never finds out how to wake it up."

"And the last?" Weiss asked. "You said there were four types of weapons."

"Oh, yeah. The fourth, well... They'relumpsofsteel."

"Excuse me?"

"They are lumps of steel," Ruby said bluntly. "Myrtenaster is a nice lump of steel. It is functional and pretty to look at. You can channel your aura through it, but then, I could channel my aura through a stapler and chuck it at Yang's forehead as a way to charge her semblance. But it won't ever be anything more. Not, at least, in our lifetimes."

"And you think I should, what, rebuild Myrtenaster? Forge a new one myself?"

Ruby nodded.

"You're serious."

Ruby grinned and nodded again.

"You're insane, that's what you are," Weiss said. "I can't—"

"You can."

"No," Weiss insisted. "I can't. I've never done anything like that in my life!"

"So?" Ruby asked.

" _So?_ " Weiss screeched.

"It'll be easy," Ruby said. "Myrtenaster's a nice, simple design. Much easier than Crescent Rose."

"I'm not a weapon geek," Weiss sniffed.

"Easier than Ember Celica then. You think getting all those folding plates to nest so neatly together was easy?"

"Probably. Yang _likes_ hitting things." Weiss shook her head. "We're off-topic. My assignment was to design something to overcome Myrtenaster's _physical_ shortcomings."

Ruby didn't speak for almost a minute. Then she slowly crossed the room and picked up her sniper-scythe. She cradled it for a moment, then looked up at Weiss. "I'll make you a deal," she said finally. "You give me two solid weeks of effort. And _honest_ effort. And if _you_ are not satisfied with your progress on the weapon you are making—on the very small off-chance that it is not completed—I'll call in a favor Herr Myn owed my mother."

"Who?" Weiss asked.

"Herr Myn," Ruby repeated. "He's one of only three Master Aura Smiths alive."

Weiss rolled her eyes. "I'm rich. If it's that big a deal I could have Daddy hire—"

"No," Ruby said. "You can't. One of _three_ , Weiss. His talent and skill are rarer than Dust. He and the others are booked years in advance. Oh, no doubt you could offer him a lot of lien, but past a certain point money is just another way to keep score rather than a practical measure of value."

"Everyone has a price," Weiss sniffed.

"And sometimes that price isn't money," Ruby said. "I've met him, once. He came to lecture at Signal. That's when he let me know that he felt he owed Mom, Summer Rose. He takes jobs because they interest him, not because he needs the money. Maybe you can get one of the others, but I think they're a lot like him probably."

She took a shuddery breath. "Anyway, that's my offer. Two weeks and if you don't think you'll have a weapon, I'll call in that favor."

"And if I tell you to keep that favor?" Weiss asked.

Ruby flinched. "Then I'll need to schedule a meeting with Professor Ozpin."

"What? Why?" Weiss asked.

"To take you out of the field."

Weiss froze. "You wouldn't dare," she whispered.

"Look at where we are, Weiss," Ruby snapped. "We're training to be _Huntresses_. This is a _Battle_ Academy. Most of the _students_ routinely carry around more firepower than a _dozen_ Atlasian soldiers. Our teachers are some of the most deadly individuals alive. There is enough Dust in Myrtenaster right now to level a building. I have a sniper rifle built into a _scythe_. _Nora_ walks around with a loaded grenade launcher. Have you seen what Coco hides in that handbag of hers? And _you_ , you have enough Nature's Wrath stored in _this room_ to wipe Beacon off the cliffs and nobody so much as bats an eye.

"This job is not safe. I know Yang worries. That she thinks I don't really understand what happened to Mom, or what being a huntress means, but I do. That's when I recognized Raven from pictures Dad and Uncle Qrow have that I asked for parley. Because if we fought her, she _would_ have killed us. All of us.

"Do you honestly think Ozpin and Goodwitch wouldn't have let us die in Initiation? Wake up! Jaune was asking about _parachutes_ when I got launched. Or in Port's class, what would have happened if Myrtenaster broke _then?_ How long would it have taken Port to get his Blunderaxe off the wall, or for us to call our lockers? If that Dust cylinder cracked, we could _all_ be dead! Yang and I at least have Dad and Uncle Qrow. But Ren and Nora only have each other. Who'd mourn them?

"So yes, Weiss Schnee. I most certainly _would_ ask Professor Ozpin to keep you out of the field. For my sake. For Yang and Blake's sake. And for _your_ sake too!"

"I…" and now it was Weiss' turn to shiver and look away. "You'd call in your mother's debt. For me?"

"Yes."

"Why?" Weiss asked.

"Because you're my partner. And my teammate. And both of those deserve the best. My best. And when you aren't being… _difficult_ ," Ruby mimicked, "and putting on your Ice Queen 'I'm Princess Schnee' routine you actually have the makings of a decent person."

Weiss opened, and then closed her mouth. Twice. "Thank you, I think," she said very slowly. "Okay. What do I have to do?"

"Do you have Myrtenaster's plans?"

"On my scroll," Weiss said, pulling up the relevant document and offering it to Ruby.

"Nuh-uh, this is _your_ weapon," Ruby insisted. "I'm just here to help."

Weiss sighed. "Fine. Where do we start?"

"What did Professor bar-Adama say the problem was? If it was simply about aura, she probably would have said—"

"She said it was physically compromised."

"Huh. Well, that's interesting," Ruby frowned slightly, then tilted her head slightly to one side. "She's not wrong, though."

"Of course not," Weiss sighed. "Alright you dolt, what's the physical problem?"

"Open it," Ruby instructed.

Weiss started to object, but then rolled her eyes, turned back to her desk, and flipped the catch that caused the weapon to break open on the hinge incorporated into one of the decorative guards.

"When you strike something with the blade, all the force carries through that hinge, and the catch," Ruby said. "The other two guards are decorative. Oh, they're functional in that they protect your hand, but they don't add to the stability or integrity of the blade, and the tang carries through the cylinder, but only that far."

"I suppose?" Weiss asked.

"My point is, because the only two connections between the blade and hilt aren't fixed, they're a mechanical weakness."

"What would you suggest as an alternative?" Weiss asked. "I still need to be able to access the Dust cylinder."

"What would _you_ do?" Ruby replied. "That's the assignment, remember? What alternatives can you come up with?"

"I can't draw."

"Yes you will," Ruby said. "I'll pretty it up some before you get to work, but you will turn in your own drawings."

Weiss glowered.

"What would Team RWBY's _academic coach_ require?"

"I hate you," Weiss said with very little energy.

Ruby grinned at her.

"Fine," Weiss muttered. She snugged the scroll into the computer workstation built into the desk and glared at the plans as though with an icy look she could beat them into submission the way she could scare away Jaune.

It didn't work.

"I could…"

She darted a look at Ruby who smiled sweetly.

"Right, I can come up with one other design."

"Three," Ruby said. "You need enough to make a choice from. And _I_ want a discussion on pros and cons."

"That's not part of the assignment!"

"You need to make an intelligent choice. Not an emotional one," Ruby said.

"Two then," Weiss said, turning back to her terminal. "I can replace the hinge and catch with something fixed, and the other two into a frame assembly that slides in and out with catches to hold it in place."

"And two?" Ruby asked.

"I—I—I could _keep_ the hinge, make these three one piece, and the hinge lifts the Dust cylinder free at an angle!"

Weiss turned to find two plates with cookies, and two glasses of milk sitting on the desk in front of Ruby. "Where did you—" a rose petal fell onto her desk. "'I'm pretty quick'," she muttered. "Right." She reached for the nearer plate of cookies, but Ruby slapped her hand.

"Three," Ruby said.

"But—"

"Better hurry or I'll eat your cookies too," Ruby said as she dipped one cookie into her milk.

"Dolt," Weiss muttered. "Fine. Since I've gone from two to three, I suppose I could make all four guards one piece. That would let me continue the length of the blade all the way through the hilt, leaving a fixed axel for the Dust cylinder. I'd need to put in a hatch between two the guards to reload it."

She turned to look defiantly at Ruby who pushed one of the plates of cookies and a glass of milk towards Weiss.

"Advantages and disadvantages?" Ruby asked.

"What? _Now?_ "

"Why not?" Ruby asked, sticking out her chin defiantly.

Weiss made a disgusted sound and harshly dunked a cookie into the glass of milk.

"Hey! If you're going to abuse the cookies, I can take them away."

"Okay, okay. Mechanically the last one is the strongest because there's the most connections between blade and hilt. It…spreads out the transmission of stress on the blade, and there aren't any moving parts that could be compromised."

"A full tang is always stronger than partial or rat-tail tangs," Ruby agreed.

"But the others offer the easiest ability to reload Dust."

"How so?" Ruby asked.

"Well…I could make multiple cylinders," Weiss said. "Then I could just pull the used one out and slip in a fresh one."

"You don't use Dust evenly," Ruby countered.

"Well…no, but still. And it'd give me something explosive I could use. Just in case."

"Pretty big explosive," Ruby said doubtfully.

"Okay, well…maybe a speed loader? Some kind of injector that I just line the vials together and depress."

"You don't use it now," Ruby said.

"But I could."

"How often do you use enough Dust to _need_ to reload like that?"

"Just because I haven't so far doesn't mean I won't. And why don't you worry about Blake's weapon like this?"

"First," Ruby said. "Because I didn't know that you didn't make your own weapon, or have a master aura smith do it. Now that I do, I fully intend to check. Second, watch her take it apart to clean sometime. There are a series of inserts inside the blade moving around to give it strength when it's extended. Lastly, almost all the power-attacks, chops, and blocks are delivered with the sheath which is a single piece. The katana blade is mostly used to deliver slashes or draw-cuts to minimize stress on the moving parts."

"You've thought this all out, haven't you?" Weiss asked sarcastically.

"Pretty much," Ruby agreed as she dunked a cookie.

Weiss gave Ruby a considering look. "I can alter it later if I want?"

"Always," Ruby said.

"Okay then. You can turn this into a detailed plan?"

"Of course," Ruby said as Weiss mirrored her drawings to Ruby's own workstation. "Yeah, these need a little cleaning up. Next question."

"Oh gods, I created a monster," Weiss muttered. "What now?"

"Do you want to do a rebuild, or start from scratch?"

"Which would be easier?" Weiss asked.

Ruby shrugged. "With a rebuild you already have a lot of the base parts done. Connecting them all together would be the hard part. On the other hand, starting from scratch you wouldn't have to do that, but you'd have to forge the whole weapon. And doing it that way gives you more time to practice and a better chance of integrating your aura."

Weiss frowned as she picked up her sword. She stepped over to the window, turned, and made a few practice cuts before grimacing.

"What is it?"

"I just…" Weiss frowned. "I can't help but wondering…"

Ruby turned her chair so her back was to the desk and crossed her arms. "Go on," she ordered.

"The ejection port is a good way to add Dust to a fight," Weiss said. "It's…elegant. And a rapier is a very…precise weapon."

"I can appreciate that."

"Can you?" Weiss asked coolly.

"Sniper rifle?" Ruby asked. "Just because I don't usually have the opportunity to make thousand-meter shots with Crescent Rose doesn't mean I can't."

"Oh," Weiss said slowly.

"And it may have escaped your notice, but I _get_ weapons," Ruby said. "So what's the problem?"

"It's…" Weiss turned abruptly and went to the window. "Do you remember that fight with the giant nevermore?"

"Yes."

"What Blake did, when she ran along its spine. I couldn't do that."

"Sure, you could have."

"Hit it, I mean," Weiss said. "Not on a run. If I stabbed it, I would have had to pause to recover."

Ruby nodded slowly. "I've seen you make cuts with Myrtenaster before."

"Yes but…" Weiss scowled. "I don't know what I'm asking."

Ruby nodded slowly. "There is nothing wrong with Myrtenaster's edge. It is a very functional edge…for a rapier."

"But—"

"For a rapier," Ruby repeated. "Look, Weiss, a blade is a lever, okay? Through length and mass it generates additional kinetic energy. The cutability of a sword is a function of its edge and the kinetic energy behind it. The more energy, the less sharpness the blade needs. The sharper a blade is, the less kinetic energy it needs. But you can also make a blade _too_ sharp. Sharpness is determinant on how hard the blade is, and if it's too hard it'll shatter under stress even if it has a fantastically sharp edge."

Weiss stared at Ruby as though she had grown a second head.

"What?" Ruby asked.

"That—that sounded almost intelligent," Weiss said.

"Thank you?" Ruby asked uncertainly. "Anyway," she continued, confidence creeping back into her voice, "the reason you don't think Myrtenaster cuts well has nothing to do with the edge. It has to do with the fact that Myrtenaster is a rapier. There isn't a whole lot of weight to the blade, so its ability to generate kinetic energy is noticeably less than that of Jaune's or Blake's swords."

"Oh." Weiss frowned. "But I _have_ made cuts," she said. "I've gotten limbs off beowolves and ursi. So…why couldn't I have done it with the nevermore?"

"Um…you were probably channeling aura into Myrtenaster," Ruby said. "Just because you didn't make Myrtenaser yourself doesn't mean you can't. Being a conduit for aura as opposed to an extension of aura is what separates, well, Myrtenaster and Crescent Rose at the moment. It'd have given you a fantastically sharp edge, but it'd have drained your aura pretty quickly too. Come to think of it, that might address some of your endurance issues right there."

"You think so?" Weiss asked.

"Uh-huh," Ruby said, once more examining the plans Weiss had sketched out.

"Blake makes cuts all the time."

"Gambol Shroud has a curved edge," Ruby said.

"That matters?"

"Yes. Also it's construction is very different."

"That matters?"

"Yes, Weiss," Ruby sighed, "that matters.

"We can improve its ability to cut. But it'll mean increasing the weight of the blade. But the other side of that is that the heavier a blade is, the less quick it is, and the less precise."

"I can't believe I'm going to ask this but...how much less?"

"That would depend upon how much you change the blade," Ruby offered. "It shouldn't take much to get _some_ improvement. But if you want to transition to a style that's more cutty than pokey you might want to look at something like a saber."

* * *

 _Just what was that bit with Sienna Khan supposed to accomplish_? I probably could have asked the question yesterday, but by the time I'd thought to ask it at all you'd been in a meeting and there really hadn't been a good opportunity for us to discuss it since then.

"They're Plan C."

 _Plan C_?

"Salem doesn't have the force available to just steamroll the Kingdoms. She needs to get the Kingdoms to destroy themselves or at least make the opening she needs to do so. The Fall of Beacon did that."

 _And she used the White Fang and Atlas' co-opted tech_. _You think taking away her toys is going to stop her?_

"Almost certainly not. I doubt we can get White Fang off the Board for Beacon. But give Sienna enough prior notice, and maybe we can fracture them so badly that they won't be useful for any follow-on strikes, at least not immediately."

 _And then Adam reforms them and carries on anyway._

"Probably."

 _You sound like you_ want _White Fang able to attack humanity_. _Just a weakened White Fang_.

"As I said, Plan C."

 _Explain._ Now!

"We only beat Salem last time because we were able to rally the four kingdoms and throw their combined might against. We were only able to do _that_ by giving them something to rally against. But if we pull this off, that rallying point won't exist and our best way to get at it is to let Salem and Cinder to win at Beacon.

 _So we need a new rallying point and you've nominated White Fang?_ _I'm having real trouble believing I'm hearing this from you. I mean, you are deliberately setting them up to die_.

"Yes."

 _Why? And don't rationalize it_.

"I already told you. Besides, too many of them agree with Taurus, or an insufficient number understand the nuance of Sienna's position. This will take them out of play."

 _You know, the younger you would be horrified of your plans, but she'd find your rationalizing utterly repellent._

"Do you?"

 _We could just terminate Cinder._

You don't respond.

 _I know you were—_

"Leave it alone," you say harshly. "And no, we aren't going to do that. We don't know what Salem's contingency plan is for something like that. Worse case, she pulls her head in and then the world is unified _and_ unprepared when they come—and they _will_ come—and they are smart enough to go for global comms first. Given what Atlas is building, yeah, they'll steamroll the Kingdoms no sweat.

"Back to my point. Maybe we can stop the Fall _and_ get what we need. I don't think so, but I'm going to try. But we also need to plan on what we're going to do if we don't stop the Fall. Preempting them is a no-brainer, but without something to unify the Kingdoms, Salem will win. She's too good at that divide-and-kill crap. Last time the Kingdoms trampled Salem trying to get to _them_. If we can't stop both, and I don't know that we can, then we may need another rallying target to get the Kingdoms working together."

 _If you turn humanity against the White Fang, you can't stop them from turning on the faunus_.

You stop.

 _Vala_ _—_

"I don't think it will go that far," you say.

 _A plans born of hopes or desperation rarely work out the way you want._

"How long did it take you to figure that out?" you ask.

 _That's not fair._

"It's life. I don't want to do it. I'm just cognizant that I might not have a choice in the matter. Unless you prefer the idea of trying to take Salem down with humanity and faunus both hopelessly shattered."

I would dearly love to refute you, but I don't know that I can.

"Adam is clearly lying in his reports. There is no chance she'll believe us over him. Maybe— _maybe_ —she can pull something off and change things. I don't think she will or that we can but I'll acknowledge the possibility. So, Plan C," you concluded. "If necessary, we throw the White Fang under the bus."

 _You know, only you would come up with a contingency plan like that._

"Surprised?"

 _A little._

"Well, I'm surprised you'd go along with it."

 _Why?_

You're saved from having to enter by a knock on your door. "Enter!"

The door cracks open and Ruby pokes her head in. "You, uh, wanted to see me, Professor?"

"Am I really that scary?" you ask.

Ruby enters the rest of the way and closes the door behind her. "Well… Yang said you broke her nose, and Weiss is pretty upset. She threw herself into the assignment you gave her and isn't talking about whatever it was you talked about so…kinda?"

"What about Blake?" you ask.

"Blake hasn't really said anything either," Ruby says. "Which is kinda normal so…yeah."

'When did I become Beacon's student counselor?' you ask me privately

 _About the time you started offering personal supplemental combat instruction_ , I reply.

Your response was something I probably shouldn't record.

'Not that there's a bit of truth in that,' you admit. 'There's damn little I can do to "refine" some of the crazy shit some of these kids come up with. Most of the deficiencies I see are a result of them not knowing how to keep personal problems from interfering.'

 _At least we don't have to worry about Dust-augmented sonic weapons in the form of—and played like—a trumpet, or Dust-infused glowstick-nunchakus or something funky like that_.

'I hate you,' you tell me. Then, aloud to Ruby: "Well, I'll try not to be too scary then. Tell me, how do you think your fist patrol went?"

"It went well," Ruby said, quickly launching into a verbal account of Team RWBY's patrol. It is pretty much the same as her written account.

"Did you plan to kill the Dust mage?"

"Wha?" Ruby asks.

"It's pretty clear, both from your report and the statements made by the rest of your team, the Dust-mage was very highly skilled," you say. "Weiss is conversant enough in Dust-lore that she should have been able to come up with how a technique she'd never seen before might be accomplished, or at least an avenue to study that might be explored. But while she was able to do so with several techniques used, there were at least three that she could not.

"By your own account, you'd managed to take her by surprise."

"She was distracted, and Weiss and Yang had created a fogbank—"

"Which, coupled with your semblance, might explain how you managed to surprise her," you agree. "Were you prepared to kill her?"

"I don't see what that—"

"She was inside your weapon's area of effect, and her body had Crescent Rose pinned in place." Time to be blunt. "If Raven Branwen had not agreed to parley you would have been extremely vulnerable to an incredibly dangerous individual. Raiders do not necessarily want to generate high body numbers, but neither do they shy from ending threats in a most permanent fashion."

"I don't see why it matters," Ruby isn't looking at you which all on its own is a bad sign.

"When you pinned her, did you do it with the intention of killing her and took an opportunity to request parlay…or did you expect to gain a parlay and gave no thought to what happened next if you didn't get it?"

"I thought about what could happen," Ruby bit out.

"And?"

"And what would you like me to say?" she demanded. "It's a huntress' duty to save lives, not take them."

"And if she'd killed you?"

"She wouldn't have. Raven wouldn't let her."

"And if Raven hadn't recognized you? What then?"

"She wouldn't have killed Yang."

"And the rest of your team?" you ask. "The Branwens at least don't traffic in people, usually. But for the Schnee heiress and the daughter of the Chieftain of Menagerie they'd be willing to make an exception."

"You don't know that," Ruby says.

"And do you know that they wouldn't?" you ask in return.

 _What are you doing?_

'She can't continue like she did.'

 _That's who she is. She isn't like us._

'Not yet,' you promise.

 _Not ever,_ I'm just as resolute.

"Sooner or later, if you continue in this profession, there will come a time," you tell Ruby, "And people will die by the choice you make. The responsibility to make that choice will be _all_ on you. And you will need to find a way to live with the consequences of that choice."

"But that isn't what happened," Ruby protests.

"No, it isn't," you agree. "But it almost—almost, Ruby—did happen. You decided you would not take a life, and you got very, very lucky. You got enough good luck that everyone lived through it. But if you rely on luck, sooner or later it'll turn sour. You don't even need to get a ton of bad luck dropped on you."

But the look in Ruby's eyes tells you that you're wasting breath.

It took more than the Fall of Beacon to crush that…you don't know what to call it anymore. Naiveté isn't it; it's stupid, but Ruby is very aware of the potential consequences. Innocence isn't quite right either. Whatever it is, it's going to take a lot more than the words you are prepared to expend at this juncture.

Damnit.


	14. Volume 1, Chapter 12: Downturn

**Disclaimer:** Would it surprise anyone reading this to find out that I do not own RWBY?

* * *

"Good," Pyrrha said. "That's better."

"Really?" Jaune asked.

"Really. Now this time, lead off with your shield. Don't just push it out at me, lean into it with your shoulder and put your whole body behind it when you move."

Jaune frowned and took a step back, trying out the movement with just his body. After two or three passes he shook his head. "Won't that slow down the shield punch too much to make it an effective attack?"

"Ordinarily, yes," Pyrrha said. "But this isn't the attack. It is a set-up for an attack with your sword. You can use it to blow aside an opponent's strike—you remember at Initiation how you deflected the deathstalker's claw?"

"You bulled past me, didn't you?"

"Yes. This will allow you to do the same on your own," Pyrrha explained. "Whether it is an attack, such as from a Grimm, or to move an opponent's shield out of the way, the goal is not to hurt your opponent with the shield—although if you can do so it is a benefit. The goal is to open your foe up to an attack with your sword."

"Hey. Let me go!"

The shout draws you away from the training bout you'd been reviewing on your scroll. Jaune had committed earlier and harder to training from Pyrrha than he had in your past, and the difference has already made itself known. That thought does not bring the satisfaction it normally would have for Cardin Winchester had once again decided Velvet was an easy target.

Someday, and you're hoping very hard that it will be soon, Cardin Winchester is going to do something that you'll be able to make a case for having the potential to cause physical harm. That or _someone_ will ask you to intervene, though you've also planned to point out to Coco that violence really is an acceptable way to deal with bullies.

Given what you've seen of her—and also Beacon's records from last year—the chances she doesn't know that Velvet has been a target are precisely zero. The records also made it more than a little clear that she and Yatsuhashi had…dealt with matters last year. The question is why they haven't done the same this year.

Speaking of a certain rabbit-faunus, who was really trying to enjoy her lunch in peace and solitude… It really is surprising how long any of your classmates survived considering the lack of foresight they have so far exhibited.

You are just resigning yourself to once more standing to the side and doing nothing when Ruby comes up off her bench, and steps onto the table only long enough to spring towards the next one without a rose petal to be seen.

Ruby running without using her semblance is a Ruby that is pissed, scared, or eager. You saw the first two at Initiation, you don't need to guess which one this is. And from the way she's gripping that fork, it is probably a good thing that weapons are safely locked away.

And that she's forgotten she can summon Crescent Rose via rocket-propelled locker.

Or that little matter of kinetic energy should she decide to user her semblance and run _into_ him.

"Hey! You let her go!"

And never let it be said that RWBY isn't willing to follow their leader.

And where RWBY went, JNPR inevitably followed, some with more enthusiasm (Nora) than skill (Jaune). Though Jaune is…looking pretty good, actually.

Ruby did…something that she might have seen in a movie, maybe. It wasn't at all effective and it did leave her open to Cardin hitting her. There was very little power in that blow, but Ruby was off-balance and...kind of a klutz when it came to hand-to-hand, something else to work on. She landed on her backside in the aisle between the tables looking more puzzled than hurt. But Cardin had been forced to release Velvet's ears and Blake and Weiss bundled the faunus away as Yang went barreling into the thug that had dared to punch her sister and JNPR landed on the rest of CRDL.

As much as you don't want to, time to go save the bad guys. Ugh.

"What, by the blessed names of Monty and Oum is going on here?" you demand.

"Well, um, we were discussing take-downs?" Ruby asked.

You look at her incredulously. "Ruby," you begin, then sigh. "Don't say anything."

"Okay."

You reach up to rub at your temples as a headache begins to form.

"RWBY—"

"Yes?"

"JNPR—"

"Oh, you mean Team RWBY."

You look at Ruby again.

"Eep?" she asks. "Being quiet now."

"Good idea," you snark. "Standing up for a fellow student was well done. But your planning—" was non-existent "—left a good deal to be desired and your execution was…" execrable, "shoddy. CRDL, your behavior was atrocious, but not, fortunately for you, expellable."

You let that sink in for a moment. "Ruby," you hold up a finger to silence Ruby, "Jaune," and you do _not_ smirk in satisfaction as Ruby's mouth snaps shut, "take your teammates, find the rest of Team RWBY, and…do something productive. And be aware, I will be discussing this…incident with Headmaster Ozpin."

Cardin smirks at you as JNPR and half of RWBY disappear.

"Misters Winchester, Thrush, Bronzewing, and Lark…"

"You're going to expel them, right?" Thrush demands.

"No."

"That bitch was threatening to break my legs!"

"Are your legs broken?"

"Well…no."

"Is your aura severely depleted?"

He shook his head.

"I will pass along your complaint to the Headmaster. I'm sure he'll file it with all the complaints he has had about this team."

"Lies," Winchester said quickly. "You can't trust a faunus."

"Who said anything about the complaints being from faunus?" you ask.

Winchester is starting to get up so you plant a boot on his breastplate and shove him back down, then sink into a crouch. "Your attitude is very self-destructive, Mr. Winchester.

"At the very least this…casual cruelty, misplaced sense of superiority, and general bigotry are going to draw Grimm like pink sap draws rapier wasps. Then too there is the matter that faunus make up a far higher percentage of licensed huntsmen and huntresses than they do the civilian population in the Four Kingdoms. So what will happen when you are put in a situation where your choice are rely on someone you have put a great deal of effort into alienating...or die?"

You stand, and he starts to say something, but you cut him off with a shake of your head. "No. Do not reply. And rest assured, what I said about discussing this with Headmaster Ozpin goes for all of you ask well." You turn to Bronzewing, Lark, and Thrush, have all been…smothered in syrup? It wasn't surprising they pissed off Nora, but to sacrifice syrup?

"The three of you get cleaned up. And then, Mr. Bronzewing, report to the infirmary and have your eyes checked; I'm tired of your squinting. After that…find something productive to do that doesn't involve harassing or antagonizing your classmates."

* * *

Blake and Weiss trailed Velvet to a bathroom in an out-of-the-way portion of the Beacon Campus. Actually, unless Blake was badly mistaken the whole wing was one of those used to house students from the other Academies when Beacon hosted the Vytal Festival.

"What do we do now?" Weiss asked.

"You're asking me?"

"Ruby made you the team's second in command," Weiss said. "And…"

"Yes?"

"You're a faunus."

"As opposed to a human?"

"As opposed to a Schnee," Weiss said. And did it without flinching, Blake noted grudgingly. "I know my family has…baggage where faunus are concerned. Even if she thinks you're a human, that's probably better than if I go in."

Blake nodded reluctantly. "Wait here and keep a lookout."

"Of course," Weiss sniffed.

Blake pushed the door open.

Velvet was standing over the sink. Tear-tracks marred her face, and her ears drooped almost to the counter.

The door shut and Velvet looked up. "Blake," she said in a voice thick with tears.

"Velvet, I know how you feel."

"I'm sure." Velvet crossed her arms, her entire posture suddenly defensive.

"I'm not—"

"Human?" Velvet asked. "I know. We all know."

"I…" Blake faltered. She'd hadn't had time to plan out the conversation in her head, but she had anticipated a few directions it could have gone. Finding out that every faunus on campus knew her secret hadn't been one of them. Far from it, actually. "How… Why…"

"It wasn't exactly hard, Blake _Belladonna_ ," Velvet said, then sniffed sharply. "You aren't the only one pretending to be human, you know."

Blake nodded.

"But you _are_ the only one pretending to herself," Velvet said.

"Why do people keep saying that?" Blake asked. "I'm not—"

"They don't go out of their way to announce what they are. You…you actively deny it though. You don't join any of the support or conversation groups. Go out of your way to avoid them in fact. Plenty of humans in all of them."

"Classes haven't been in session for that long."

"Almost two months."

"I've been busy," Blake said defensively. "I learned to fight outside the Kingdoms, there's a lot of foundational education that I'm trying to get caught up in."

"So which one are you joining?" Velvet asked wryly.

"I…" Blake sighed. When, exactly, had the conversation moved from her comforting Velvet to examining her own beliefs? "I'm not confused about being a faunus," she said, reaching up to undo her bow. She stepped closer to the sinks and turned to examine herself in the mirror. "Maybe I don't know what being a faunus means for me, but that's different. And I…I _was_ part of an organization. And I thought we were making things better. But it wasn't, not really. And then there's Weiss…"

She turned back to Velvet. "Anyway, I'm faunus. But until I get my own head sorted out, I'm not sure that I'm in a position to help anyone."

"You helped me," Velvet said.

"I—" Blake was spared having to reply as the door opened.

"—outside when we can all be in here?" Jaune asked. "Hey, Blake, Velvet."

"Jaune," Blake said uncertainly as JNPR and RWBY filled the bathroom.

"Kind of cramped in…here? We're in a women's bathroom!"

"Clearly, you dolt," Weiss' voice came from somewhere near the door.

"Hey. _I'm_ your dolt. Jaune can be someone else's dolt or, or something non-dolt-y."

Velvet choked on something between a laugh and a sob. Blake wasn't sure which she'd have chosen, but dearly wanted to join her.

"And…" Jaune frowned suddenly. "Blake, where's your bow?"

Blake held up a hand.

"And you have…cat…ears. You're a faunus?"

"Clearly," Weiss said.

"Yes," Blake agreed.

Jaune gave her a look that was as close to pure confusion as Blake suspected she would ever see. "I know I'm not exactly the most observant guy but… When did that happen?"

"Probably when she was born," Yang said sagely. "I understand that's the usual time."

" _Yang_ ," two or three voices said, and then Ruby eased out from between Jaune and Pyrrha, shoving her sister to one side as she did so.

"It's kind of cramped in here," she said.

"I like it," Velvet said.

Blake nodded slightly. Rabbit faunus. She would.

"I don't blame you, you know," Velvet told Blake.

"Do you, uh, want us to wait outside?" Ruby asked.

Velvet shook her head quickly. "You're Blake's team. If she trusts you with her secret, I'm okay."

Blake quietly nodded agreement. She _hadn't_ let in JNPR. She hadn't even told her team, not willingly, even though she'd sort of planned to eventually...at least she had before _Weiss Schnee_ ended up on the same team, though honestly she didn't seem as bad as Blake had feared. And she still hadn't told them about the White Fang. But it wasn't worth nitpicking those details over.

"I know some do," Velvet continued. "Blame you, I mean. I know some blame those who don't need to do anything special to pass. But…if I could pass too I probably would, but I can't." Her smile was only a little bitter. "My Team Leader wouldn't let me."

"Coco?" Ruby asked.

"The beret she wears? And the glasses used to be Fox's. Our first night together she said neither of us were allowed to hide anymore. Even if he did look pretty badass with them."

"I'm sorry," Blake said.

"I'm not." Velvet looked at Blake in the mirror. "At the time I was furious. But I'm better for it, I think. What about you?"

"I've been…involved for a long time," Blake said, turning back towards her friends. "For once, I didn't want to put up with the stares."

"It's easier as a huntress. We're almost only judged on skill." Velvet managed a wry grin, but her tone was bitter. "When the choices are life, or being eaten by a Grimm, people stop caring if it's a faunus that saves them. At least until the danger is past."

"There's a difference between stares and what Winchester was doing," Nora spat, shouldering her way past Jaune.

Blake turned towards the excitable girl. Whenever she'd talked of breaking legs before, Blake had always thought there was a degree of humor in it. Right now, the look she wore had very little humor, and if given her way Blake wasn't sure she'd stop at legs.

"There is," Velvet said. "But people like him aren't the worst of it."

"Excuse me?" Pyrrha asked.

"You heard about the White Fang disrupting a rally the week before classes started?"

"It was on the news on the flight in before Initiation," Ruby said. "But the report was interrupted by Professor Goodwitch."

"Well…there are always people like Cardin," Velvet said.

"Bullies thrive on petty power because they have no strength of their own," Nora said.

"Yes, exactly," Velvet agreed, giving her a curious look.

"Orphan," Nora said tightly. "Kids are either the most generous souls alive, or sociopathic shits."

Velvet barked a laugh that turned into a strangled sob. "But the worst of it, what really hurts, are those that are supposed to be your friends, but aren't. People like the White Fang, and Ozpin…"

"I'm sure those two are nothing alike," Weiss said from somewhere in back and Blake resisted the urge to hide her face in her palm. "I think I of anyone here would know."

"But they are," Velvet said. "Years ago, the White Fang was a really positive influence."

"Are you serious?" Weiss demanded. "Do you not know what those—"

"Their actions over the last five years are, at best, morally questionable. Self-defense is one thing, but some have taken it to extremes beyond what anyone can call 'self-defense.' Arson, kidnapping, and murder aren't the deeds of someone trying to make the world better. They are repugnant to society at the best of times. For someone trying to claim the moral high ground they are reprehensible."

"Thank you," Weiss said, crossing her arms and giving Blake a defiant look.

But then Velvet turned on her. "I won't claim to know White Fang's actions in Atlas, against the SDC, or you personally. But they also have done a lot to combat the prejudice and petty racism that your family's company 'claims' to oppose. They made progress. In Vale the wage imbalance has been slashed, we can get hired by companies that wouldn't give us a chance, I can actually go into most restaurants and get a meal. I had friends growing up who I couldn't go to their birthday parties because 'no _animals_ ' were allowed on the premises for 'sanitary' reasons."

Blake held her breath. It was rare to see Weiss so fully on the defensive. She didn't like it, and her natural instinct was to come back harder, but this time— _this_ time—Ruby grabbed her partner and stepped back before the white-haired girl could respond.

"They used to be a really positive influence," Velvet repeated bitterly, turning to Blake. "Not just for faunus, but for the world. And now…now they still think they're making our lives better, but they're not. They're only hurting us."

"But—"

"Disrupting an FRU march, Blake?" Velvet asked. "They're idiots. They were making progress, _good_ progress. The Faunus Rights Union and the SVLC are using the exact same tactics the White Fang used to use and continue to push ahead. The White Fang threatens not only that, but everything being a huntress stands for."

"I'm sure that's not—"

"I know," Velvet said softly. "It has to be harder for you than anyone to hear that, but it's true, Blake. They're so wrapped up in their hurt and misery that they think the only way forward is violence. That the only way to get what they want is to make sure everyone else feels the exact same way. And that…"

"Brings the Grimm," Blake finished. Weiss started to say something, only Ruby silenced her and Blake was almost pathetically grateful she had.

Velvet managed a watery smile, but Blake couldn't handle even that much.

"It that why you do not fight back?" Pyrrha asked, and now Blake found herself just as grateful to the tall redhead. There was zero chance she understood the cause of the awkward tension that had filled the bathroom, recognized she was socially stunted enough to not be able to defuse it, and had chosen to step in and change the topic anyway.

"My semblance and combat techniques are very…singular," Velvet said. "And…not much leeway, honestly. Short of crippling him, I don't think I could best him. Maybe not even that. But if I did that, I'd be just another one of those 'wild animals' attacking an 'upstanding citizen.'"

"That's not remotely true," Ruby said.

"Who cares about truth," Velvet said bitterly.

"Uh…I do?"

A complicated series of expressions flicked across Velvet's face and her ears bobbed. "Is she—"

"She is," Blake said quickly.

Velvet's expression froze at confusion for a moment, then she barked out an explosive burst of laughter and her ears stood up. "Don't ever change, Ruby Rose."

"Um…okay?" Ruby asked uncertainly.

"And…it doesn't matter. You may want the truth. Most don't. Or they don't care enough to demand the truth, at least. Cardin's family is powerful. Wealthy. It doesn't matter what the truth is, if they can get enough people to believe what they _say_ is the truth. It wouldn't matter that he, and his team, have been harassing faunus students since Initiation, or that he…" she broke off abruptly, took a sharp breath, and then started again. "The only thing that would matter would be the headlines, what the talking heads say in the morning news shows… I would probably be expelled, and I can't afford that. I need this."

"Why?" Ruby asked. "I mean, if he's making you miserable, that's a danger in the field."

"It's not so bad. He's not in the field with us," Velvet said, deliberately misunderstanding the question.

"There are only so many ways a faunus can get ahead," Blake said, looking at Velvet as she addressed Ruby. "It's better in Vale than…other places," she said awkwardly, "but that doesn't mean it's good. I know there are faunus who do stuff they'd rather not, like pretend they are humans, just to be able to make a living."

Blake was pretty sure Velvet wasn't just interested in 'making a living,' and absolutely certain that she wasn't wanted for a crime (much less having an actual conviction on her record). That left needing to provide for a family, most likely. Having a huntress in the family could mean a nice house instead of the slums, adequate diet, medical care, quality schools…

For a moment Blake was strongly reminded of another faunus who could pass for human, but then she pushed it firmly back into the past where Ilia belonged. "Ozpin cares."

Velvet's reply was a harsh tone utterly out of place with even the bitterness she had let leak out. "You aren't the first to say it, Blake. And he may even mean that when he says it. But when the angry letters start coming in, when messages are left, or the Council calls, do you really think he'll sacrifice himself for us? No, he'd _say_ it is my choice. Tell me that I just need say the word and he'll make it all…go away. But at a price. That maybe next time he won't be able to. Or that someone else, someone not as well-meaning would take his place. That we couldn't be certain that whoever replaced him would care about faunus, or do as good a job as he does, which would put our teams at risk when they aren't quite good enough, or those they need for backup aren't good enough.

"Have you seriously looked at this Academy, Blake? Ozpin may be all for acceptance, but look at the teachers! I admitted in _class_ to being bullied and Oobleck just commented on how 'terrible' that was."

"Uh, Professor bar-Adama looked ready to step in before even we did."

"But she didn't."

"We were closer," Ruby said, scuffing her shoe. "And, well, I'm pretty fast."

"O-okay," Velvet said. "Maybe there's _one_ teacher. But most of the staff? They just don't care. And while Ozpin talks a good game, and says it doesn't matter who a person is, only what they do, he doesn't actually do anything. And-and maybe I'm doing him a disservice by saying it's because he knows how civilians, and the Council, will interpret it. But I've been listening to his pretty words for the last _year_ and seeing damn little actual support to back them up."

* * *

"You aren't the first visiting faculty Beacon has had," Coco says.

"I imagine it happens fairly often," you reply. You're in your office, enjoying coffee—what else?—and taking the opportunity to discuss…campus life.

Sure you were.

"Beacon is, not soft, but a good post for a huntsman or huntress who needs to spend some time recovering." There. That was nice and neutral-sounding.

"Last year one of them was a big-shot Dust specialist." Coco half-smiless. "Velvet insisted on taking all of her courses, but she missed out on Doc Oobleck's intro history."

"Which explains why she's in that class. Not what she was doing in the cafeteria alone," you note. "You clearly recognize that Velvet is a target for…certain personality types. And you've taken steps in other cases, why not here?"

Coco's jaw tenses and her eyes are dark fire. "Our classes make meeting up for Monday and Wednesday lunch…impractical. We've warned Winchester. He has seen fit to ignore those warnings."

"Coco, Beacon is a Huntsman Academy. Violence is our stock in trade. It is our job to prepare you and your classmates for life outside these walls. The things that live out there do not care. And knowing your own limits isn't just prudent but a necessity."

"And…what, they're supposed to figure out how the handle bullying on their own?"

"Or ask for help."

Coco's eyes narrow.

"Or have it offered by her team."

"Maybe you didn't listen to me. Winchester has ignored us."

"And yet you no more came to a professor than Velvet did," you observe. You lean forward across the table between the two of you. "Let me ask this then, and I am going to be very blunt. Why haven't you taken him behind the dorms and beaten the snot out of him? Or done it in public, for that matter?"

You time it just about perfectly for Coco to completely lose her composure for only the second time (or is this now the _first_ time?) in your memory. She manages to clear her airway and gives you a look that would have probably been more effective if she hadn't been wearing the school uniform (although she wore her customary beret and sunglasses much the same way Ruby wore her red cloak). The expression on her face is priceless.

"Did you just ask me why I haven't beaten up a student of this school?"

"Yes." The timing wasn't so good, and she was still partially anesthetized by her reaction to your previous statement.

"I would think the law calls that 'assault,'" Coco says as you pass her a roll of paper towels.

"We aren't in the City of Vale, and I assure you, the Council has a great many more pressing problems than a first year student at Beacon getting hurt."

"Uh-huh. And Headmaster Ozpin?"

"I've just told you what his policy is for teachers involving themselves in the…squabbles of adolescents."

"Oh that…" You sit back and watch. As it turns out, even at eighteen Coco Adel is imaginative with her invective.

* * *

"What did she mean?" Weiss asked once they were back in their room.

"What did who mean?" Blake asked evasively.

"Velvet," Weiss said. "She said she knew it had to be harder for you than anyone to hear about the White Fang. Why?"

"I don't want to talk about it," she said.

Weiss frowned. This whole 'teammates' and 'friends' thing was harder than she'd anticipated. SDC Leadership training had addressed the advantages—and disadvantages—of being friend _ly_ with subordinates, but that was different. And then there was the issue of Ruby and Yang. Their family was important to each other. She didn't want to poison it with her own feelings regarding her family. And they weren't only sisters, but Blake's and her partners. That put them in an awkward spot if—

"But I'll answer on two conditions," Blake said.

Weiss gave her a level look, torn between 'trying to be a supportive friend' and 'seek a position of strength from which to negotiate.' Finally, she asked: "And those are?"

"We don't discuss the White Fang. Not in general. Not in particular."

"Wait, what's there to discuss about the White Fang?"

"Take it or leave it, Weiss."

There was a finality there Weiss hadn't anticipated. Yang looked ready to stand up for her partner and Ruby would likely step in at that point. She would not be a good partner if she forced her partner and team leader to involve herself, but… "But we _will_ talk about it."

"Sure. Just like we'll talk about your family and the SDC," Blake agreed.

Which they hadn't, and Weiss had no intention of discussing them. Ever. But… "What's your second condition."

"You don't tell your family. Or report it to their security service, or the SDC, or try any kind of workaround."

"That seems grossly unfair."

Blake shook her head. "You knowing won't put your family at risk. And them knowing who my family are may put my family at risk."

"From who?"

"The SDC has taken hostages before, even if they haven't called them that."

"That's not remotely true."

"Holding someone for their own protection?"

"Completely different!" Weiss insisted.

"Whatever. Those are the conditions, Weiss."

"Fine!" Weiss snapped. "But if White Fang hurts my family—"

"It'll be because we failed to stop them."

"Er…what?"

"You heard me." Blake crossed to the window and refused to look at her. "You heard Velvet. White Fang is playing into the Grimm. You know, the scary things outside the Kingdoms? The things we're supposed to destroy?"

"I know what the Grimm are," Weiss snapped. She took a breath. Calm, she reminded herself. Be calm. "So, you agree that those animals need to be destroyed."

"Don't call them that," Blake said in a suddenly low voice as she turned on Weiss.

"What should I call them then? Rabid?"

"Don't."

"Don't what, Blake?"

"Blake."

"Stay out of this, Yang," Blake said, not breaking eye-contact with Weiss as she slowly undid her bow and let it fall to the floor. "Am I an animal?"

"What?" Weiss asked.

"Am I an animal?" Blake asked. "I must be, everyone knows that faunus are dirty liars, and humans are as pure and _white_ as freshly fallen _snow_."

"Well excuse me for—"

"No," Blake said. "No. I won't excuse you. I've put up with the cutesy animal metaphors all my life from people who wanted to be seen supporting the 'right' causes. I've put up with cruel animal metaphors from those who want us for cheap labor, or because having someone to denigrate makes them feel better about themselves. And I've put up with uncaring metaphors from one magistrate after another when we petition for the same redress that would have been given a human without a second thought. I won't put up with it coming from a teammate."

"Easy, Blake," Yang said.

"No!" Blake brushed off Yang's hand and stepped away from both.

"I didn't call you an animal," Weiss said in a low voice.

"Yes. You did. When you called the White Fang—" Blake chopped herself off. "When you call one group of faunus animals, you called us _all_ animals."

"Blake," Ruby began, only to be stopped by the icy chill Weiss projected.

"Don't ever defend them to me," Weiss hissed. "As long as I can remember, those _animals_ have been kidnapping family friends, murdering board members, and doing their best to destroy my grandfather's company."

"Okay," Yang interjected, "Weiss, that's—"

"As though your father ever needed anyone's help to destroy something that he could destroy on his own."

Blake's scornful denouncement caused Weiss to recoil. "Y-you, how _dare_ you!"

"It was easy," Blake's hushed voice lacked its earlier heat and cast a pall over what had become Team RWBY's sepulcher. "You made it _really_ easy for us to become very, _very_ tired of being pushed around.

"That's a truth, Weiss. Would you like to hear another one? I am White Fang."

"Y-you're what?" Weiss stuttered. She couldn't possibly have heard what she thought Blake had just said, and that bothered her even more than the quaver in her voice.

"I'm White Fang."

Weiss couldn't breathe. She couldn't feel her heart beat. She could feel every pore on her body. Every inch of her hair ached, and she felt like she was standing on the bottom of a very, very deep pool.

" _Gahh!_ " Weiss recoiled as something sharp and unpleasant smelling assaulted her nose. she was sitting bent over on…something, and she could feel Ruby pressed tight around her right side which meant the furnace to her left was Yang. Weiss tried to scramble away, but Yang held her down.

"Calm down, Weiss." It had to be bad if Yang was being serious. "Breathe."

"I'm fine," Weiss muttered, but did what she said anyway.

"Yeah. Sure, you are. Just like that, in and out. Again. Good."

"I'm fine," Weiss insisted, and this time they let her up.

They were sitting on her bunk. Ruby to her left, and Yang at her right. Blake was on her bed, one leg hanging over the edge the other to her breast, her fingers were laced together on top of her knee with her chin resting atop it giving Weiss a look that was intent, but worried, and which may or may not be fake.

"Yang," Ruby said in a soft voice. "Secure the window."

Secure the…window? Weiss gave Yang a confused look as she crossed to the window, locked it, and then sat on the low bookcase in front of it and crossed her arms. Ruby had gotten up and did the same for the door, pulling aside one of the desk chairs to sit on.

"I…I really didn't want to ever have to do this, but I'm putting my team leader hat on," Ruby said. Then she reached behind her and produced a red ball cap with 'Team Leader' embossed in black on the front. "We, Team RWBY, has some problems."

"Ruby, that's not—"

She cut Weiss off by holding up a hand. When did Ruby get that kind of leadership skill?

"We do, Weiss," she said. "You and Blake have…issues. And we can work at those, or not, but right now they mean that you might not trust each other, and _that_ I can't allow."

"What do you mean you can't allow it?" Weiss asked in a low voice.

"Just what she says," Yang said in a voice that was both even and serious and completely unlike her. "If you and Blake can't trust each other in the field, it puts the whole team at risk. It's not just a need to trust each other with your lives. Like Velvet said, bad feelings bring Grimm."

"And that brings up the second point," Ruby said. "Weiss, you had a panic attack. I'm supposed to report that to medical."

"No. You can't," Weiss whispered. "Medical will revoke my license."

"It's a three-month medical suspension pending outcome of counseling, not a full revocation," Ruby said. "And if I have to write up a report, I'm going to recommend the same for you, Blake."

Weiss jerked and looked at Ruby in surprise, then, unwillingly, looked at Blake who looked very _un_ surprised.

"You deliberately used the truth of your past as a weapon to attack another member of this team when they were vulnerable," Ruby hissed. "How fucking _dare_ you."

Weiss stared at Ruby and realized that Blake and Yang were doing the same.

"What?" Ruby asked uncertainly. "Was, uh, the expletive too much?"

"It wasn't uncalled for," Yang allowed.

"Good," Ruby said flatly. Team Leader firmly back in place. "However… However, I don't intend to write a report. But that's contingent on Weiss convincing me this was a one-off. And…I don't even know what I want from you, Blake. You were provoked. I won't say you weren't. But that was completely uncalled for."

"You'll need to convince Blake and me too, Weiss," Yang said. "Blake, whatever Ruby comes up with, for Weiss and me as well. And Rubes, sister or not, I'll report all three of you if I think you'll make a decision that endangers all of us."

"But especially me," Ruby said.

Yang shrugged, but didn't reply either way.

"But you want to be a huntress more than anything," Weiss said. "If Yang reports— Why would you put that at risk for me?"

"Get over yourself, Weiss," Yang said. "This isn't all about you."

"Belladonna and I, then."

Ruby's jaw worked for a moment. "Not more than anything," she said finally. "There are anythings, prices, that aren't worth it. But you're part of this team. You're our W. You're my partner and…and my friend. And I think you're a pretty good person when you aren't being all…Schnee-like."

"Schnee-like?" Weiss' lips curled. "I feel like I should be insulted."

"Quiet. Let Ruby speak," Yang said.

"And Blake's our B. She's my friend." Ruby turned her expression on Blake, and her eyes were chips of moonlight glinting off a Solitas glacier. "And the one I trusted with the lives of my sister and my partner if something happens to me. And right now, I don't know that I can do that. I don't know what would have happened if, if this had been in the field I'd gone down against those raiders. And that is _all_ your fault, Blake!"

Ruby glared for a moment, then at Weiss, and then sighed and gave her team a hurt look. "So, this goes for all of you, not just Weiss, and not just Blake. Sister, friend, whatever. That gives you a little leeway where 'has to' is concerned with Team Leader Ruby. It gives you _zero_ leeway with the well-being of this team and everyone on it. That includes yourselves."

"That has to be— _is—_ about the well-being of the team, and everyone on it," Yang said evenly.

"Yep. And the leeway is you get a chance to convince me to break the rules. If any of you aren't comfortable with that, then I expect you to report it. I will _require_ that you report it."

"Fair enough," Yang said.

"Weiss?"

"I can't exactly refuse, can I?"

"Yes, you can," Ruby said. "It isn't true consent if you can't say no. And today it's you and Blake. Tomorrow it could be Yang, or me."

"I can't refuse," Weiss said again. "You don't… I can't… I can't, can _not_ , be expelled, Ruby."

"Medical separation—"

"I don't care what it's called," Weiss snapped at Blake. She looked across the room at the other girl, who was still sitting with her chin on her hands, over one knee. Blake's reply had lacked its earlier heat, and was trying to be…what, supportive? Comforting? Did it even matter? "Look, it's…complicated."

Ruby sat and stared at her for a while, but then finally turned. "Blake?"

Blake didn't reply except to look past her.

Ruby set her jaw. "I'm not kicking you out."

"Yet," Weiss said.

Ruby scowled at her. "I'll thank you not to put words in my mouth, Weiss." She turned back to Blake. "If you want to leave, Blake, you can," Ruby continued in a pained voice. "But that choice is on you. Not Team RWBY." She looked away, struggling to get the next words out. "It's not… It's not on me. Just you."

"Blake," Yang whispered.

Blake looked at Yang, and the discussion in the _onsen_ came back to her. Would it be fair to Weiss and herself to stay? Would it be fair to Ruby and Yang for her to leave? Just how much damage were the four of them carrying around? Did all huntsmen and huntresses start out so...broken? The four of them, Nora and Ren without any family, Jaune with too much family, Pyrrha and the unwanted pressure of fame...

"I'll stay," Blake said, forcing her voice into an even tone she didn't feel.

"Okay," Ruby took a deep breath. "Okay," she said more firmly. "Weiss, you get to start."

"For as long as I can remember, my Grandfather's company has been at war with the White Fang. War. As in, actual bloodshed. Stolen dust shipments, destroyed production facilities, Board Members and their families disappeared, family friends murdered, my uncle… When I was twelve they put a bounty on me—"

Blake made a sound and Weiss glared at her. But aside from that sound, Blake made no move to reply. To protest. To justify. And… That was it, Weiss realized. Ruby might have meant it, but—

"A bounty?" Yang asked.

"Dead or alive. Alive was more, and even odds that they'd kill me slowly and film it, or use me as a bargaining chip," Weiss said coolly. "Security became everything. I was never allowed out of that mausoleum of an estate without an armed escort. Mother developed a fondness for wine. And every night my father would come home…furious.

"It made for a very…difficult childhood."

"I triggered the panic attack when I said I was White Fang," Blake said.

Weiss glared at her. "Yes."

"Do you have anything you want to add?" Ruby asked, tapping her scroll furiously.

Weiss narrowed her eyes. "Are you trying to look up counseling advice on your scroll?"

"No?" Ruby asked, her silver eyes wide.

Weiss wasn't sure if she should scream, laugh, cry, or some combination of all three. But after a moment she shook her head. "No. Nothing more."

"Blake?"

"My parents helped start the movement after the Faunus Rights Revolution," Blake said. "I was, quite literally, raised by White Fang. After the Revolution, it was supposed to foster understanding and peace. But all the Revolution accomplished was change some of the worst of the laws in one Kingdom. The others took a look at what happened and followed suit to save themselves the blood and treasure. But it didn't change how most humans saw us. Or how they treated us. So…the White Fang tried to give faunus a voice.

"The first protest I remember going to, I think I was four. Every rally. Every boycott. I was there. I thought we were making a difference. And the way Velvet tells it, maybe we were. If you'd asked me yesterday, I would have said I was a youthful optimist. And now…now I just don't know.

"Five years ago, White Fang's leaders…my parents, stepped down to return to Menagerie. We…had a falling out over their choice to leave. We've only spoke twice since. Neither of them are what I would call happy occasions. Si…the new leadership favored a more…proactive approach. It wasn't enough to picket a shop that refused to serve faunus, it had to be burned. Companies that abused faunus labor forces had their cargos hijacked. And…it was working. Sort of. There was less…blatant discrimination, but it wasn't because humans respected us. It was because they feared us even more than they hated us.

"The White Fang was becoming the very thing it despised. So…I left."

"Just like that," Weiss said skeptically.

"No, Weiss. Not 'just like that.' But I'm also not going to discuss this any further. Not today." Blake looked up at Weiss, and Weiss tried to decide if she was having another panic attack, or in the tense feeling in her chest was because of the pain in her…Blake's eyes. "Look, we can spend the next four years hashing out all the wrong the SDC has done faunus, and the White Fang has done the SDC and the Schnee family. Or we can leave it in the past and move forward."

"Just like that?" Weiss asked incredulously.

"Probably not," Blake admitted. "We're probably going to have to fight out some of that history. But we can agree to do it in a way that minimizes the hurt to a…friend. At the very least, we can do it respectfully. Or we can let every hurt our species had done each other, every injustice, everything your father turned the SDC into, and the way the White Fang responded poison us, ruin our…friendship, and destroy Team RWBY the way it has destroyed everything else it touches."

"The White Fang tried to have me killed."

"SDC security teams have tried to kill me."

"Uh, guys?" Ruby asked before the tense standoff could resume. "Why would knowing your parents were the former leaders of the White Fang put Blake's family in danger?"

"My parents aren't just the former leaders of the White Fang," Blake sighed. "My father is Chieftain of Menagerie."

"Wait," Yang said. "You mean you're a princess?"

"No," Blake said, giving her partner a flat look.

"But your father's sort-of a king, isn't he? And you're his daughter, Princess Blakey!"

Blake glared at Yang, not sure if she was grateful or pissed at the diversion. "I'm the Chieftain's daughter. Nothing more."

"I didn't know that," Weiss said softly.

"Most people in the kingdoms don't care about Menagerie," Blake said. Then added bitterly: "Except how to get more faunus to move there."

"And that's why you want me to keep this quiet?" Weiss asked, and only through ruthless self-discipline kept her voice to a quiet fury. "You think I'd use the SDC to-to kidnap you or something?"

"No," Blake said. "That's…actually the last thing I was worried about. But…there's very little I'd put past your…Jacques Gelè."

Weiss deflated. Yang's calling Blake a princess had distracted her from her anger and fear. From the look on the other blonde's face, she knew it too. She had tried to gather it back together, to start that very knock-down drag-out fight Blake had wanted to put off, but Blake herself had disarmed her. She didn't blame Weiss. And the person she _did_ blame was one Weiss herself could not refute.

Actually, Weiss thought bitterly, her father probably would do just that thing.

Or worse.

"I can't say that you're wrong."

"So where does this put us?"

"Honestly?" Weiss asked, she felt empty. For once she was cold—not physically, but a chill of the soul—as everyone accused her of being. "I have no idea."

"And going into the future?"

That was… Where did she want to go? With her father on one side, and the White Fang on the other, could she ever relax? Could she ever be safe? Would stopping the White Fang mean having to kill every faunus that supported them, not just now, but in the future? And would stopping her father mean the destruction of her _grand_ father's company?

She didn't know the answer to the first question, but now that the panic had passed, she was clear-headed enough to realize that Blake's being in the White Fang didn't scare her nearly so much as those questions. Well...no, that wasn't quite right. Camping, standing in the river in her bare feet with Blake pressed to her back as the faunus showed her how to tickle a trout. That night in a hammock with her belly full of fish she had helped gut as Yang jokingly made her hammock rock...

In the Forest of Forever Fall, where Grimm stalked the night, armed to her teeth with only a few friends who were simultaneously more and less experienced than her, Weiss had felt both relaxed and safe. And again, soaking in the _onsen_ of Valentina, having faced off against one of the most feared bandit tribes...

That really only left the questions of where did she go from here, would stopping the White Fang require genocide, and would she have to destroy the SDC to stop her father. The first was uncertainty, but she was deathly afraid the answer to the next question was 'no'…and that last one was 'yes.'

Weiss looked at Blake weakly, "Good question."

"Awww," Yang cooed.

"Group hug!" Ruby declared.

"What? _No!_ I—" Weiss found herself behind picked up by Yang who bundled her into a cloud of rose petals. " _Oof_."

"Hello, Weiss."

"Blake," Weiss replied. There really wasn't enough room to move her arms away from her sides. Ruby and Yang had arms aplenty, however and didn't seem to be inclined to release either of them soon. There didn't seem to be a point in fighting it either, and after a moment longer she relaxed into the feeling of their auras against hers. Yang's was a bone-deep warmth of standing in the sunlight on a slightly cool day. Ruby's a rush of barely-contained energy. Blake's wasn't lazy—never that—but there was a calm self-assurance to it, and a silky, furry quality. Sort of like those movies she had to sneak to watch at home, that end with two people curled up in front of a fire, wrapped in a thick, warm blanket, cuddled up with a dog and a book.

She glanced up as Blake bowed her head to rest her forehead against Weiss'.

"Thank you," Blake whispered hoarsely.

"For what?"

"Hope."

And just for a moment, maybe, _maybe_ Weiss realized that maybe she didn't need to fear those answers after all.


	15. Volume 1, Chp 13: Picking up the Pieces

Weiss didn't like the machine shops. They were loud. They were draughty. They were dusty. Her normal ensemble of white and ice blue attracted grime and grease as though they were two halves of Pyrrha's semblance. They had the highest-quality protections, neither the greenest patch of…green in the Emerald forest could stain her combat skirt, nor mud from Forever Fall at its muddiest could cling to her boots. As it turned out, blood could be rinsed off in a stream. But the grime and grease of the machine shop? That was another story entirely.

Weiss didn't like the Armory. Myrtenaster was elegant, precise. The occasional pass with a whet stone and honing oil, or a brush with solvent to keep the Dust ejection port free of residue was all the maintenance it needed. Not for her the automated bullet press that took hoppers of bullets, brass, primers, and Dust and spat out a hundred cartridges a minute. Or the bench loaders for those like Ruby who wanted more…personalized ammunition. Or the tedious manufacture of arrows or crossbow bolts. And then there was Nora who was bouncing between three large work tables and humming happily as she assembled grenades….

Weiss didn't like the Magazine. She _especially_ did not like the Magazine when accompanied by Ruby. Her Dust supply from home was of the highest, most premium grade available. Its grain was finer, the crystals were of the brightest cut with the fewest internal occlusions, its energy content was more potent. The Dust stored in the Magazine was third-tier at best, and third-tier from a second-rate company at that! And no matter how carefully it was packed, she could not shake off the sensation that Ruby was just waiting for the opportunity to sneeze and blow them all into very tiny pieces.

Weiss did _not_ like this portion of Beacon. Not at all. And worst of all, her partner didn't seem to notice. Ruby skipped along at Weiss' side, cheerfully explaining how this machine could pre-mix Dust to obtain desired effects, or that could pull dents out of armor, or a third be used to remove a nick from the edge of a blade. And having fully explored all of the destruction (both real and to fashion) promised by the Machine Shop, the oppressive of the Armory, and the cataclysmic catastrophe waiting through the doors to the Magazine, Ruby at last led her to a small, non-descript door and ushered her inside.

It was surprisingly dark for such a well-lit area. And hot, oppressively so. Tools, most of them powered, and many simply larger, more powerful variants of those in the Machine Shop or Armory were crammed into a space that was much, much smaller.

Ruby led her through all of this to a back wall and through another door.

Like the previous room this one was cramped. Unlike that room it wasn't cramped because of the stuff in it, it was cramped because it was tiny. Actually, this one was smaller even than their dorm's bathroom. And it was blindingly, almost garishly, white. The only color came from the faint blue computer interface, and a grey conveyer belt.

"What is this?" Weiss asked.

" _This_ , Weiss, is where we order parts. There is a limit to what we can do, so others smelt and refine metal for us to use, or make certain parts like plasma injectors or phase coils. If Beacon doesn't have something in stock and it might not if you were making, oh, say a power glaive that's also a fusion-pumped plasma cannon, we could order it."

"Since I'm _not_ making a power-glaive plasma cannon," Weiss asked. "What do I need?"

"Bar stock. Something too hard won't be able to had the stress placed on it and will shatter. Something too soft will be unable to hold an edge, or point, or will bend in combat. Pure iron is brittle, so we need to consider not just trace elements, but how those elements are distributed.

"Valian smiths, back in the really old days, used pattern wielding to achieve a what they considered the ideal distribution of elements within a blade. The Mistrali achieved a similar effect through mechanical construction, wrapping a fairly hard jacket that could hold a fantastically sharp edge around a softer core to withstand shock. Vacuo used this crucible that—"

"As interesting as the history lesson is," Weiss interrupted. "How do we actually take a lump of steel and—"

"We don't," Ruby said. "A rapier is a really classical design, so that's all done for us. Look, we go to the interface. Then you put in the particulars that we came up with… Look, just trust me, okay?"

Weiss rolled her eyes. "Fine." She pulled out her scroll, went to the terminal, and began copying numbers from one to the other.

"These have all been tabulated," Ruby said. "I mean, unless you're doing something really exotic, there are loads and loads of actual research articles on them. Beacon gets bar stock—not as much as Signal or the other combat schools because full-up replacement doesn't happen that often here—and then the computer takes a look at what you want—unless you already know what you want, that is—and figures out what you need so that you don't need to sort through ten million different kinds of metal blanks."

"No, only fifteen."

"Let's see," Ruby said. "Okay, we can do this. You don't want a Dust-infused blade so you can—"

"Yes, I do," Weiss said.

Ruby frowned at her. "Yes but…you want to be able to infuse Dust when _you_ want, and many different kinds, right? These come with it pre-infused. It's part of the trace elemental matrix. That's how Blaise's fire-sword works. But…what would happen if you tried to add an ice-Dust infusion to something that had burn Dust permanently embedded in it?"

"Nothing good," Weiss frowned. "So I can eliminate these…"

"And these two can't take an infusion at all," Ruby added.

"That leaves seven."

"See? We've gone from thousands to fifteen to seven," Ruby said. "Now it gets fun."

"This is _fun?_ "

* * *

 _You know, Ruby is going to insist on building in a gun_.

"Probably," you agree, tossing a piece of popcorn into the air and catching it in your mouth before turning back to the security feed from the smithy.

 _You're enjoying this, aren't you?_

"Of course not. The hinge/catch compromised the physical integrity of Myrtenaster. It was a design flaw that needed to be addressed before it became a problem in the field. You know this."

 _Uh-huh. Sure. Keep telling yourself that_.

"Shush. I want to get as much out of this as I can before Fox arrives."

 _You mean you want to avoid talking about their other problems_.

"Is there anything to talk about?"

 _I didn't think it was this bad last time_.

"Three points. First, Blake and Weiss had at each other a lot earlier this time around," you say, "They haven't had as long to grow accustomed to each other. Second, this time Blake used her past as a weapon. That's different than blurting it out accidentally."

 _Not that dif—_

"And _third_ ," you say over me, "this time Ruby sat on her team. I'm somewhat interested as to why, but it doesn't really matter. Instead of Blake and Weiss having time and space to decompress naturally, she's kept the pressure up and forced them to confront their issues."

 _That's…a good point, actually._ _You think this will work out for the better?_

"I don't know," you say thoughtfully. "Last time around they sort of shoved it aside. They left it in the past and never really examined it again until after Haven by which point both had done an awful lot of maturing, and Weiss was no longer heiress to the SDC. The plan she and Winter had cooked up never really had a chance to get off the ground."

 _What you're saying is, we've jumped-started the skills development, and we should consider this a way to speed up their maturity?_

"Possibly. In any case we'll keep an eye on it, and prepare to support Ruby in any way we can if she needs help putting her team back together."

 _If they can_.

You take your time in replying. "We were always better together than apart. Some of us were slower learning that lesson than others. And for some of us it was a lesson that needed repeating. Let's see if we can mitigate that for Team RWBY."

 _And if we can't? If Weiss—_

"Or Blake," you say.

 _Or Blake,_ I add reluctantly, _force the issue before truly resolving it…_

"They agreed."

 _Verbal agreement, and not just to set the matter aside this time. Do you think it will be so easy that Ruby just needs to pull Weiss aside to pound metal for a while?_

"No," you mutter.

 _Right. So if they force the issue?_

"There are times when you really are a pain, _Amy_ ," you say.

 _That doesn't—_

"Force the issue how? Fight for real? Walk away? You can't seriously think they'd join Salem, do you?"

 _Ironwood can be damn reasonable when he wants to be, and he isn't prejudiced no matter what his public image might suggest._

You gesture and I turn off the vid as you snatch up the bowl and throw out the rest of the popcorn. I say nothing as you wash the bowl roughly, dry it, and slam the cabinet door closed once you've put it away. "Those who break faith with the unity shall go down into darkness."

* * *

"Professor." Blake's tone is so neutral it's painful. It's the first thing she's said since the office door closed, and now she sips her tea to avoid saying more. Cute.

"Blake," you reply in a matching tone. Then smile, slightly. "I didn't expect you to request an office visit."

"I didn't expect to make one," she said with a frown.

"What changed?"

"I told Weiss I was part of the White Fang."

"That's…unexpected. How did she take it?"

 _How the hell can you sound so natural?_

'Shut up,' you think back at me.

"She—" Blake sipped more tea. "Not well," she said finally. "We were…arguing and I lashed out."

"And?"

"She doesn't get it. She doesn't understand how her attitude, the way she acts…" Blake bite off whatever she was going to say, but you have a pretty shrewd idea of where she was going to go.

"Has she ever really had a chance?" you ask.

"How much of one does she need?" Blake asks bitterly. "How much of a chance do they all need?"

"They all?"

"Humanity."

"Is that fair?"

Blake's bow…flops. "Probably not," she admits. "But…I mean, you get it."

You manage to stop your wince before it does more than tighten the corners of your eyes. "I'm a huntress," you say, "with all the experience, capabilities, and resources that go with it. Weiss…is not."

 _Nice recovery. Very diplomatic_.

'Shut up, Ametrine.'

"Fine. Maybe I am expecting too much from her. But how much should I expect? Even if I just…forget the SDC and humanity in general, how much can I call my 'teammate' out on her behavior?"

"That's something the two of you are going to have to work out between you."

"Good luck with that," Blake said bitterly. "Maybe I should just leave."

"Why?"

"It's what I've always done before. From Menagerie, from my parents, from the White Fang… Things get hard, and I run."

"Okay, let me put it this way. Why haven't you?"

Blake stands and begins to pace angrily.

'When did I become the Guidance Counselor?'

 _Go you. Embrace that teenage angst_.

"I was more interested in hurting Weiss at the time. Then Ruby and Yang blocked us in."

"And after?" you ask. "You could walk out that door, down to the airpad, and catch a ride into Vale easily enough."

"Yang's had people abandon her all her life. Her mother, Ruby's mother, her dad for a while. Not physically, I just…don't think he handled it well. I don't want to be just another name that walked into her life and then out. And Ruby, she has the skills and tactical ability to be here. She's working her ass off to make up for the missing academics though. And now she's watching her team fall apart and there isn't anything she can do to stop it."

"And Weiss?"

"What about her?"

You raise an eyebrow.

Blake makes a disgusted sound. "Maybe we can work past all that history. I've been there before. Hope is like a poison. It strings you along, makes you actually start to believe so that when it all comes crashing down it's like giving the knife that little extra twist."

"Have you given any thought as to what you're going to do?"

Blake manages a slight shrug. "We'll see, I suppose. Ruby is bundling Weiss off to the armory to build a new weapon. So, I guess we're both getting some space for now anyway."

 _You are sooo lucky_.

"For now?"

"I…received a message."

"Oh?"

"From Sienna Khan." Blake examines her tea closely but looked up without sipping. "She's—"

"I know who she is," you offer. Blake's look turns rather sharp. "I have personal reasons for keeping rather closer tabs on the leadership of the White Fang than most."

"Oh." Blake looks at her tea again.

"More tea?"

Blake manages a weak laugh as you pour her more. "She wants to meet."

* * *

"Look, I checked with Professor bar-Adama and the technique's pretty much the same. Here."

"Where did you get that?" Weiss asked, staring at the bar of iron Ruby shoved at her.

"Something for you to practice on."

"Practice on? I thought you said there wasn't time to learn how to actually forge a sword."

"What I said was, you don't actually need to learn to forge a sword," Ruby corrected. "Look, this—" she gestured towards the bar-stock Weiss had gotten, "has all the right trace elements worked through it, and it's been rough-shaped to the right size. You don't need to know how to make a sword because your aura is going to do that for you."

"But—"

"What you don't have is forever to play around with it," Ruby continued over Weiss. "Every strike doesn't just add your aura, it also pounds out those trace elements. You can only afford to lose so much before you compromise its material structure. And so…

"This is easy. First we start the blowers," Rub hit a switch. There was a loud rumble of an air-system sucking out air and pumping in fresh. "That's important, now the forge." She went to a box-like contraption and slotted the cannister of red Dust into a slot on the side. "'Kay, now we put in the bar." She went around to the front and threw open the bolt, then lifted a catch and dropped a solid plate-like door to reveal a long if somewhat narrow interior. "The use of Dust means we don't have to wait forever to get it up to temp and we don't need to worry about air draft since it's formulation of burn and wind." Ruby said as she took the bar of iron from Weiss and shoved it in deep.

"Oh! Ear protection! That's important too," Ruby said handing Weiss a headset that did a fine job of reducing the blowers to a low background rumble. "And this apron and these gloves look around the right size."

"It's ugly," Weiss said, taking the heavy leather garment. "Even Coco couldn't find anything to pair this with."

"Eh…she probably could," Ruby disagreed. "But it'll protect you from sparks and hot metal which, this one time, is more important than fashion."

Weiss frowned. "You're planning on taking pictures, aren't you?"

"Of _course_ not!" Ruby grinned.

"Dolt," Weiss hissed, but belted the apron over her combat skirt.

"Okay, now grab the tongs and take the bar out…" Ruby's eyes widened as Weiss reached for the forge. "Gloves! _Gloves_ , Weiss. That thing is hot."

"Of _course,_ it is you _dolt_ ," Weiss said. "It's been pumping burn Dust into it." She rolled her eyes, pulled on heavy leather gauntlets, flipped the door open, and used the tongs to pull out a bar of glowing metal. "Now what?"

Ruby held out a hammer. "Bang away."

"Wait." Weiss looked at the glowing bar of iron. Then at the hammer. And then at Ruby. "You expect me to take that," she pointed at the hammer. "Bang on this," she gestured to the iron. "And create a new sword?"

"Well not that, obviously," Ruby said.

"Good."

"That's just to develop a feel for hammering."

Weiss laughed and dropped the bar back into the forge.

"What are you doing?" Ruby asked.

"What does it look like?" Weiss asked, taking the apron off. "bel-Adama only asked for plans."

"What? Weiss, no—"

"What am I supposed to do?" Weiss demanded. "Skip classes?"

"No!"

"Tell Professor Goodwitch I can't fight the next time I'm called up?"

"You still have your old swo—"

"Exactly!"

"No!" Ruby sped past her partner in a flurry of petals to get in front of the door.

"Move," Weiss hissed.

"No."

"Yes!"

"You promised me two weeks," Ruby said. "You _promised_."

Weiss glared at her, but Ruby didn't flinch.

"I hate you," Weiss whispered.

"Th-that's okay," Ruby said. She thought Weiss really needed a hug, but she was also pretty certain that giving her one right then would be a bad idea. "I-I rather you feel _something_ than be all…empty."

Weiss wordlessly turned, throwing the apron on carelessly, pulled out the bar of iron, grabbed a hammer, and began attacking it.

Ruby winced. Started to correct her, then winced again. There was a savage, manic energy to Weiss, and Ruby couldn't tell if the bar had become some personal demon she was expunging, or if she saw someone—or worse, a particular some _one_ —and was in the midst of beating them to a violently gory death.

The furious peal of hammering continued long after the iron had shaded from yellow-white, to deep cherry, and finally to a dark grey. Only gradually did it die out, ending with a clatter as the hammer slipped from nerveless fingers.

Ruby carefully moved tongs, hammer, and badly beaten iron to one side, then knelt next to her partner and gathered her into her arms. She grabbed a disposable rag, meant for cleaning but still soft, and mopped at Weiss' tear-tracked face, but this only gave silent tears a voice in frame-shacking sobs.

* * *

 _You don't do_ anything _easy, do you?_

"Did you seriously just ask me that?" you ask.

 _Well…what do you want me to say?_

"Speak comforts to me, Amy."

 _I have none to give_ , I reply maliciously.

"Funny. How did I know you were going to say that?"

 _Seriously though, are you sure_ —

"No I'm not sure! Every damn day, I'm. Not. Sure. What do you want me to do? Pull them aside and tell them the truth? Tell them how it doesn't matter? How the lucky ones die before having a chance to know just how bad it gets? Hell, we could _really_ go off script, find Taiyang and Raven and lock them in a closet together. Wouldn't that be fun?"

 _Damnit, I'm trying to help here._

"Then actually _help_ ," you snap at me. "I can't…I can't do this."

 _Then throw it all away. Stop trying to only make ripples. Make_ waves.

"I _can't!_ " you snap. "We have only two points of contact, and one will never trust us. Not in the time we have."

 _And if you're wrong?_

"I'm not. But even if I was there is a difference between trusting someone and what you're suggesting. It won't happen. Ever. And that means we can't afford to lose our only real shot. And _that_ restricts us to ripples. Because waves will screw us over and make things worse."

 _How could it possibly be worse?_

You fall silent, and since we're in the middle of an argument that is never a good sign.

"The Fall of Beacon didn't actually cause that many casualties," you reply at last. "Lots of property damage, but aside from the loss of Beacon and the CCT, most of the damage was to infrastructure. Buildings. The real loss of life came from when the cruisers went down and two of them were out over the bay.

"Even the assault on Beacon, the actual number of casualties just wasn't that high. They hurt, but in the grand scheme the loss of the facilities hurt more. No, the real casualty was global public confidence and trust in huntsmen and huntresses. Well, that and turning world opinion against Atlas. Dividing humanity, driving a wedge between humanity and faunus, that did more to further Salem's plans than the casualties she managed to inflict."

 _So_?

"Cinder hacked the stadium, remember?"

 _Match fixing_.

"If she can get into that, she can get into the stadium controls itself. I'll bet at least one of her contingencies is to have the stadium crash. Just…shut down the counter-gravity drive entirely. Drop it, tens of thousands of people, and the top current generation of huntsmen-in-training… Drop it all right on the middle of downtown Vale. Casualty figures would be at least an order of magnitude greater on the stadium alone. Even more from a densely populated urban area… Have you given any thought to what her other contingencies might look like?

"I can't deal with all the threats facing us. You agreed with me, remember, _Ametrine_?"

 _So ask for help_.

"Nice. Got anyone you recommend?" you shoot back. "Maybe I should just go over to Ozpin's office and tell him I know all about the Maidens, the Relics, the silver-eyed warriors, his little club, and oh, hey, one of his closest allies is a traitor, but the one he really needs to worry about is getting ready to _fuck the planet_. Something tells me that won't go over well. There's a reason we agreed to keep our actions separate, after all. And if we can't go to him, who _can_ we go to? Goodwitch will tell Ozpin, Ironwood would imprison us until we told him the 'truth' not that he'd ever believe it."

 _Qrow_?

"Unstable. Drunk. Unpredictable. And unlucky. Those last two make him an awesome huntsman, and the first two make him just a little difficult for us conspiracy-types."

 _Okay. What about going after Raven directly?_

"We have nothing she wants. If we try it'll be a fight. Even if we win that won't really gain us anything. And against her and what she's put together, we'd have to go all out and that has its own problems and would be far from unnoticeable. And even if we did win, there wouldn't necessarily be any of them alive."

 _Menagerie?_

"Doesn't really have the resources we need."

* * *

"I can't believe I did that," Weiss sniffed.

Ruby held her a moment longer, but when Weiss pulled away she let go. "Why? You sounded like you really needed that."

"I don't…Schnee's can't be seen as weak."

"You aren't weak, Weiss," Ruby said softly.

"I just had a breakdown. The other day I had a panic attack. What'll happen tomorrow?"

"Someone you trust and love—"

"I don't—"

"—Trust and Love," Ruby repeated loudly, "used a piece of her and your past to attack you. It wasn't fair. You were both already hurting. And I am _furious_ with Blake over it."

"You don't show it."

"You need me to be Partner and BFF—"

"Please, no."

"—Ruby more than you, and Blake, need me to be Team Leader Ruby and…address her. Besides. I had Yang pack up all her books."

"You didn't," Weiss said, looking at Ruby with wide eyes.

"I so totally did," Ruby said.

"All of them?"

"All of them," Ruby said. "Yang had to get Nora to help hold the bed up, and I think Pyrrha thought I'd gone crazy when I told her I was punishing Blake for being a bad girl. Jaune went all red and speechless for some reason. But Blake now has less headspace until she gets her books back."

"That's…"

"And I've put a library hold on her so that she can only get out class-related books."

"That's…that's…"

"She's restricted to campus unless part of a group or on specific class assignment, so she can't buy any more in town. And any packages for her have to be pre-approved so she can't sneak any books in until I lift restrictions."

Weiss shook her head. "There aren't words."

Ruby thought about that for a moment. "Best partner ever?"

Weiss managed a smile. It was a small thing, but still real. "Best partner ever," she whispered.

"Do you feel better?" Ruby asked.

"What kind of question is that?" Weiss asked.

"An honest one, requiring an honest answer. Do you feel better?"

Weiss glared at her, then looked away. Her shoulders fell slightly. "Yes. I suppose I do."

"Well then, there you go."

"I still had a breakdown though."

"Meh."

"You can't just 'meh' that away, Ruby."

"Meh," Ruby said stubbornly. "Look, Weiss…" Ruby sighed. "Just this once, for one moment, I'm going to pretend I know all that Team Leader stuff I don't talk about. You were owed. Okay? Between everything that happened before you came here, and everything Blake threw at you. You. Were. Owed. And you waited until you were in a totally safe place where _you_ were safe, and where having that breakdown didn't put other people in danger. So…go you."

She stood and offered her hands to Weiss.

After a moment Weiss took her hands and allowed Ruby to pull her to her feet.

"Good. You ready to give this another go?"

"I suppose I must," Weiss said.

"Great!"

Ruby slid the bar back into the forge. "Let's talk hammer."

"My arm's sore."

"It's sore because you were doing it wrong. Throw a little aura at it and this time we'll do it right."

Weiss frowned. "Why did you let me do it wrong?"

Ruby shook her head. "I wasn't letting you do it wrong. I was letting you pound your anger out. Believe me, I know how…cat…cat-something. Catheter?"

Weiss looked at her askance "Cathartic?" she asked warily.

"Yeah, that, is." Ruby shrugged. "I was, um…really pathetic before Uncle Qrow started teaching me to use a scythe. It was good to go to the armory because I could just vent my frustrations on a piece of metal. Of course, everyone else was there actually making their weapons so it kind of sucked too. But we're talking about you. So…

"Hammers. First, the one you're using is too small." Ruby picked up the went to a rack and selected a 2.5-kilo hammer she'd offered Weiss before. "Use this."

"I can't lift this. Not for long enough."

"Sure you can. Look, put it on the anvil. Face down. Now, grip the handle with your thumb and forefinger. Keep the grip nice and firm, but not tight, and then wrap your other fingers around the handle. Just…sort of rest them there.

"Now, earlier you were muscling the hammer down. You don't need to do that. You don't _want_ to do that. Just let it fall. Gravity will do the real work, you just need to guide it."

"I'll still need to pick it up."

"And for that you'll want to keep the head close to your body." Ruby selected another hammer and found a block of wood she slapped down on top of the anvil. "Watch this.

"Hammer comes back…"

She rotated her wrist so the shaft of the hammer lay along her forearm with the head near the crook of her elbow. "Lift…" she rotated her arm at the shoulder, lifting it while keeping the head close to her body and letting the hammer naturally swing at the top of the lift so that the head was not-quite touching her shoulder. "And rotate." Wrist spun, the hammerhead described a half-circle before dropping down, fingers guiding. The hammer struck the wood and recoiled so that the hammer lay along her arm that was already on its way back up as it repeated the motion. "Use the fingers to give a little flick at the end," Ruby continued as the hammer spun at the top of the motion. It hit and went back up again.

"And don't try to muscle it when it hits! That just transmits vibration through your arm and then you're spending aura so that it doesn't totally wreck your elbow and wrist. Let it bounce off the metal and you'll recover most of the energy from the fall to help lift it again." She hammered the wood three times while saying this.

Ruby stepped back. "Okay. Your turn. Whack that a few times and then we'll get you started on some metal."

"And then I try to forge a sword," Weiss said skeptically.

"One day for the hammer. Then we can try aura. You just need to have the general technique right to swing a hammer. Aura's a bit more tricky, you need the metal to pick up your aura because that's the whole point of this exercise, but you also need aura to do all the fiddly stuff you don't have time to learn."

"Remember, I promised you only two weeks," Weiss stated.

"Pff. Figure two days on that. Less, since you're an overachiever. When you have it right it's really apparent."

* * *

"I can't believe you boxed up all my books."

Yang rolled up on her side and looked down at her partner. Blake was sitting in the middle of the rug staring mournfully at the empty bookcase under the window.

"Eh, Nora did the heavy lifting."

"Because you asked her to."

"Ruby's idea."

"You're throwing your sister under the airbus?"

"Nope," Yang said, popping the second consonant just as hard as Ruby ever managed.

"What?"

"No throwing," Yang said. "It was Ruby's call, and the right one."

"How can you say that?" Blake whispered.

Yang pushed herself up so she was sitting, then hopped down and sat opposite Blake. "Right now, Weiss needs Ruby more than you do so Ruby sent me as her proxy."

"Excuse me?"

"I won't pretend to know what all history you and Weiss have with each other, or the White Fang and the SDC have," Yang said. "But what you said to Weiss was totally uncalled for."

"I know that!"

"But you did it anyway," Yang said.

Blake looked away uncomfortably.

"This isn't something that can be waved away like pretending you're human or making us go without coffee because you didn't ask for directions. Those are essentially harmless if not particularly pleasant for some of us. You attacked a member of the team, and you hurt the internal dynamics of the team, and those aren't things Ruby can overlook."

"So she had you take away my books?" Blake asked.

"You're being punished," Yang explained.

"Punished?"

"Yeah, you know, the administration of disciplinary action to—"

"I know what the word means, Yang," Blake sighed. "Just…I can't believe she took away all my books."

"I was all in favor of puns," Yang said. "I always appreciate a captive audience. But Ruby said that wasn't really a pun-ishment because I'd do it anyway." She grinned as Blake winced. "Thing is…" Yang's voice drifted off.

"What?" Blake asked.

"What, what?" Yang asked innocently.

Blake's eyes narrowed. "You thought of something."

"Okay, yeah… Um, just how much have you looked into what Team Leaders can do?"

Blake shrugged. "I haven't, really."

"I did," Yang said. "Don't get me wrong. I don't want the job. But I spent so much of my childhood being the responsible one that, well…I really cut loose at Signal."

"You haven't here," Blake said.

"The good clubs are further away," Yang said dismissively. "My point is, I'm just enjoying being a teen for once, but I still worry about Ruby. So, the thing is…yes, she can slap the library, travel, and mail restrictions on you. But to do that, she has to do all sorts of paperwork. She's not exactly adverse to it, but she has to put down whether it's because of academics, medical…or discipline. She has to document the incident. She has to, well, you get the idea. And that can have consequences. Not just for you and Weiss, or her because she's the Team Leader. But for all of us. For Team RWBY, not just the individual parts.

"So…she told you that you're on restriction, and that's it. No paperwork. No reporting. Nothing that she can do to stop you if you go anyway."

"So instead she's setting me up to fail," Blake said bitterly.

"How can you say that?" Yang asked in surprise.

"It's not hard. First you tell me she's punishing me, then that aside from taking my books away she hasn't really done anything, and then when I slip she can use that to justify kicking me out."

Yang stared at her partner in unfeigned shock. Oh, she could sort of see the logic. But it was a twisted, evil sort of logic that was completely at odds with who Ruby was, and was unlike Blake to come up with. "Do you really believe that?" she asked after a long moment.

Blake sprang to her feet and began to stalk around the room.

She really needs a tail to lash angrily, Yang through as she watched her friend.

"Yes," Blake said. She shook her head. "No." She stopped and glared at Yang. "I don't know! Alright? I don't know," the last coming out in a bitter sob.

"You're missing the point, Blake," Yang said carefully. "Oh, you could go around the restrictions. And don't tell me that you aren't good enough to keep anyone from noticing if you did because I won't believe it." She paused, giving Blake an expectant look, and received a small hiccup. Under the circumstances that wasn't too bad so she went on. "Ruby'd be disappointed when— _if_ —she found out. But she's not setting you up to fail. And even if you did, she wouldn't kick you out.

"I mean, Blake, seriously, all this extra running around she and I are doing. Boxing up your books, not doing the paperwork, her dragging Weiss to the smithy every chance she gets—she's having Weiss forge an entirely new weapon, not merely do the design work Professor bar-Adama asked for. Partially that's because Myrtenaser really is compromised, though perhaps not to the degree Ruby's implied, but mostly it's because she thinks giving the two of you space while you figure things out will help. I'm not sure that it is, but that's neither here nor there—"

"Your point?" Blake asked irritably.

"My _point_ , is that filling out the paperwork would be _easy_ compared to all the extra work she's throwing at herself and me. And the reason she's doing it is because she wants her team back, and she doesn't want, at best, disciplinary marks in your and Weiss' files for something that she let get out of control."

"That's not what happened," Blake protested.

"You know that. And I know that. But I also think we both know that Ruby has a way of looking at the world that isn't exactly the same as everyone else."

Blake looked away. "Well," she said with obviously forced levity, "you're not wrong."

Yang waited.

"Why are you explaining this to me?" Blake asked lowly as she sank into a desk chair.

"What I'm—what Ruby's—getting at is, how important to you is Team RWBY?" Yang asked.

"By making me castigate myself?" Blake hissed.

"If you need to see it that way," Yang said evenly.

"How else am I supposed to see it?"

"You could try taking it as a challenge. What's most important to you, the books, or our team?"

Blake's eyebrows shot up. "Seriously?" she asked skeptically.

Yang shrugged. "That's how Ruby took it when Dad refused to get strawberries for a month. She could have nipped down to the farmer's market at any time. For that matter we had some growing in our garden out back, and I think she's memorized every wild strawberry patch on Patch." She grinned madly as Blake winced. "Anyhow, she was so miserable at the time, it was pathetic.

"Thing is, she could have spent the time focusing on that misery, on the punishment. Instead she took it as a challenge. What was most important to her, the strawberries, or being a huntress."

"Being a huntress," Blake said. "No question."

"Now there isn't. At the time… Well, suffice to say it was a near run thing," Yang said.

"Thank you. For explaining."

"No problem. We good?"

Blake nodded.

"Good," Yang said, looking away as she ran a hand through her hair. "That's good."

Blake cocked her head to one side. "What's wrong?"

Yang looked at her.

"You're stalling."

"Pretty much, yeah," Yang agreed. "I'm pretty sure I owe you a major apology."

"No you don't," Blake said quickly.

"Yeah, actually, I do," Yang said. "I joke. I tease. I pull pranks. Some of it's me taking after Dad. Some of it's my way of deterring Grim. Some of it is playing up the stereotype so that people misread me. Some of it's that it was my only real outlet when, well…" she shrugged.

"Weiss and I actually talked about it when we were camping. I don't aim to hurt people, I don't want to hurt people, with my jokes. Not only does it go against what it means to be a huntress, it goes against the person I want to be.

"But when you called Weiss out yesterday, you were, quite rightly, calling me out too."

Blake slowly blinked, and gave her partner a long, blank look. "Yang…what in the name of…" she shook her head, "what are you talking about?"

"How many times have I called you 'kitten' or 'pussycat'?" Yang asked in reply. "I think we both know me well enough that I didn't mean any…projection or whatever it is you want to call it. But I also need to keep in mind that most people won't know me that well…and that a lot of humans have used those kinds of nicknames to denigrate faunus…and that's the attitude they're going to be familiar with. So…I'm sorry."

"Apology accepted," Blake said. "And no, I never felt belittled or demeaned by you."

"Well that's a relief," Yang grinned. "Obviously, I'm going to have to find something else now. I suppose 'Tiger' is a non-starter?"

Blake sighed and resisted the urge to hide her face in her hands. "Yang."

"Oh relax, Blake. I'll come up with something. You'll see. And when I do, it'll be perfect."

Blake grabbed for a pillow and threw it at Yang.

"Hey, I didn't do anything."

"You _thought_ it."

* * *

"I see you learned what a citation is, Yang," Weiss observed.

"So, you think it's good?"

"No," Weiss said flatly, then sighed. "But neither will I be completely embarrassed to be on the same team as someone turning it in."

"I think she likes it," Ruby said. "She only said mine was approaching delusions of adequacy."

"Harsh grader," Yang said. "We should make sure she never goes into teaching. She'd last to the first essay, then have to be carted to the infirmary for an apoplectic fit at the poor grammar."

"Essay?"

The sisters turned and watched warily as Weiss turned to Blake.

"Pardon?" Blake said, every bit as wary.

"Your. Essay." Weiss took a deep breath. "My responsibilities to this team's academic achievements are ones I take seriously."

Blake didn't reply for a very long moment. But then she opened a drawer of her desk, and pulled out a folder which she passed wordlessly to Weiss.

Weiss didn't so much as spare Blake a glance as she leafed through the pages. "Do it again," she said, dropping it in Blake's lap.

"I just—"

"Do it again," Weiss repeated woodenly.

"Weiss," Ruby began.

"The premise is entirely without support," Weiss said.

"Eyewitness accounts—"

"The assignment was to make use of source documentation—"

"Alright," Ruby clapped. "Weiss, why don't you help make sure that those witness accounts are properly cited. I know. You can go to the library and see if you can find any other material to support Blake's argument."

"If I must," Weiss sighed.

"Are you sure you should have done that?" Yang asked once they were alone.

"Did you really think Weiss _wouldn't_ find fault with Blake's essay?" Ruby asked.

"No?" Yang asked uncertainly. "So what—"

"Pyrrha and Jaune are going there too. I just arranged for them to wait so they could all go together."

Yang snorted. "You hate Pyrrha and Jaune that much?"

"I trust them that much. Weiss respects Pyrrha, and if anyone knows how to handle two feuding teenage girls it'll be Jaune."

"Go seven sisters," Yang said in wonder.

"Exactly."

They lapsed into silence.

"This can't go on," Yang said abruptly.

Ruby seemed to deflate and sank to Weiss' bed. "I know," she said mournfully.

"It's been almost a week, Ruby."

"I know."

"I mean, it was bad when they were ready to fight at the least sign. But this…"

"I _know_ , Yang," Ruby said. "Do you…do you think a team-night, movies, snacks and everything, would help?"

Yang grimaced.

"Yeah. That's what I think," Ruby said morosely. "I mean. I know what needs to happen."

"Blake and Weiss need to seriously have it out with each other."

"It's not that easy. There's a lot of pain there. On both sides."

Yang gave her sister a sharp look, but Ruby said nothing more, or even seemed to notice just how much of what was in those 'team leader files' she had just let slip. "You know Blake's afraid of you," she said instead. "I don't think she thinks that you're just going through motions before you kick her out…but I don't know that she isn't either."

"I was worried about that," Ruby said.

"And?"

"I'm not going to kick her out, if that's what you mean."

"So, it's a baseless worry? That's…great," Yang said.

"Not really," Ruby said morosely. "Then reason I was worried is because I thought if she felt that way she'd leave 'before I could kick her out.'"

"That's—"

"It makes sense," Ruby said. "A way of retaining control over your own destiny."

"Uh-huh. And what does the fact that she's still here mean?"

Ruby shrugged. "Maybe that it's working?"

Yang snorted. "And yet she and Weiss are still walking around like Winchester juggling a dozen cannisters of Dust and asking 'what's the worst that can happen?'"

Despite herself Ruby giggled, but she sobered quickly. "I figured taking away her books was harsh enough. But beyond that, I don't know, Yang. I just… I don't know. Weiss needs me to be her partner right now. Can't you do the same for Blake?"

Yang nodded slowly. "I am, but… Rubes, can I be honest?"

"Always," Ruby said.

"I'm glad you're team leader."

Ruby's head came up, a curious expression on her face. "I know we never talked about it. After Initiation, I mean. Before you were all about me being on my own team. I thought…I thought _you_ wanted your own team. As leader, I mean."

"Yeah," Yang said, flopping on Blake's bed. "Not really, leading my own team, I mean. I knew that much, I just…thought I wanted you to be on your own team. But now…I wouldn't have it any other way.

"Let's face it, after Dad fell apart I had to step up. Having to sit to the side, and having to watch and not being able to be with you, just in case, probably would have killed me. But for once, I'm happy _not_ being 'Big Sister,' or having to make the hard calls, or grow up early."

"I got into Beacon early. You had those parties Dad doesn't know about."

"Uh…yeah. Those," Yang chuckled nervously. "As you put it: nope! I'm enjoying just being a teen for a while. Well, huntress-in-training."

"Same thing," Ruby said.

"Thing is, Ruby, you're going to have to do something soon. The Profs have said it often enough. This isn't a safe job. I know others have noticed. Heck, _Jaune_ has noticed that something is going on. How much you want to bet that the Professors know something is wrong?"

Ruby grimaced.

"Exactly. How long do we have for Blake and Weiss to figure this out before bar-Adama, or Goodwitch, or _Ozpin_ decide they have to intervene?"

"Probably not as long as I'd like, but probably longer than is a good idea," Ruby said softly. "And if I can't fix it before then…" she shrugged.

"Won't be your fault."

"Team Leader," Ruby said. "It kind of is. Well, maybe not _fault_ , but it'll still be my responsibility."

The other thing is…can we trust whatever we build between us is as strong as what we had before?" Yang asked.

"And Blake's walking around like she expects me to kick her out at the slightest provocation. Or maybe just kick her."

"There's that."

"Do you think you could get Blake to lead off?" Ruby asked.

"Not a chance. You with Weiss?"

"Nope."

"We could trade?"

"Nope."

"Then…I'm out of ideas. Maybe ask Uncle Qrow?"

"I thought about contacting Weiss' sister, or maybe sending Blake's parents a letter, but I don't think either would go down well."

"Weiss has a sister?" Yang asked, but then, at the look Ruby gave her, "never mind. And no, probably not."

"And I'm holding Uncle Qrow's suggestion in reserve."

"Aren't we already deep into Gone-To-Hell stages of planning?"

Ruby sighed. "Okay." She sat up. "I have one idea. I'm going to need special permission from Professor Ozpin. And it has the potential to cause all sorts of problems since we're only huntresses-in-training."

"We'll deal."

"If it works, it's going to be…messy," Ruby warned. "And frankly, it's probably going to set Blake off this time instead of Weiss."

"I'd say she deserves it, but nobody deserves this," Yang said.

Ruby managed a very weak smile. "Nope."

Yang suddenly rolled to her feet, crossed to the window, and threw the curtain open.

"Think of something?"

"Y'know what? I might have done that thing." Yang turned back. "It isn't gonna fix this…thing Blake and Weiss have going on. But you know Blake's really cut up about the White Fang?"

Ruby nodded.

"Well, Velvs invited Blake to…I guess it's a community mixer this Friday. I know you said no wild parties but…can I take Blake out on a date?"

* * *

Bumblebee purred to a stop.

Yang killed the engine, snapped down the stand and looked around. The buildings were clean, but it was also clear the area had seen much better days. The houses were on the small-side and crammed close together. Many had plots of vegetables instead of grass. Window-mounted air conditioners struggled against the summer heat instead of more efficient central units.

"Still got the food?" Yang asked.

Blake glared over the cooler in her lap.

"Great!"

Yang helped her off the bike. "Helmet?"

Blake set the cooler on the pavement, then handed the borrowed helmet across.

"Bow?"

"No."

"Okay," Yang said. "It's coming off. First, it's all scrunched from the helmet. Two, the invitation said 'no bows'."

"I don't believe you."

Yang shrugged and dug around in her belt pouch before handing a small card over to Blake.

Blake looked at it, then flipped it over. Scrawled in black marker was 'NO BOWS!'

"I hate you," Blake said, handing the invitation back before undoing the ribbon concealing her ears. "What is this anyway?" she asked, lifting the cooler.

"Mac and cheese."

Blake looked at Yang. "Really?"

"Totally."

Blake gave her partner a wary look before opening the cooler. "If this is one of your jokes…" nested in towels in the cooler were a pair of large casserole dishes filled with something that smelled…really good, and the brown, bubbly crust of cheese on top certainly had potential, but… "This doesn't look like macaroni and cheese," she said, closing the cooler.

"That's because that stuff you get in a box in stores should be banned by inter-Kingdom treaty as a crime against cheese," Yang proclaimed, taking the cooler from Blake as she walked up to the doors of the community center. " _This_ , however, was made with real macaroni and four kinds of real cheese—meaning it was made from milk and bacteria rather than the byproduct of an industrial chemical process—onions, tomatoes, and baked to gooey perfection.

"Hi!" she said brilliantly to the middle-aged woman in the greeting area with…were those kangaroo ears? So cute! "I'm Yang, this is Blake," she shifted the cooler to her left hand as she dug out the invitation again.

The woman stared at the cooler for a moment, before her attention jerked to the card. "Oh, Velvet invited you?"

"We're classmates of hers up at Beacon," Yang said obliviously. "Food goes where?"

"Drinks are on the left, thank you."

"Oh, no. Hot dish. The coolers are to keep it warm on the trip."

"Center table then—"

Blake hurried after Yang who was already out into the middle of the room. "Yang," she hissed, "what are you do—"

"Hey, Velv!" Yang called.

Blake resisted the need to hide her face in her hands as halfway across the hall a familiar set of rabbit ears detached themselves from a small sea of very similar ears.

"Yang?" Velvet asked as she hurried over, her accent thicker than usual. "What are you doing here?"

"Well, I haven't been to a party since I got to Beacon, and Blake wasn't going to come on her own, so I'm her plus one."

Velvet said nothing for a moment, then she reached up, grabbed Yang's hair, and pulled her down.

"Hey, watch the hair."

"You do know that you are the only human here?" Velvet murmured into Yang's ear.

Yang straightened. "So?"

Velvet stared at her.

"It's a party, right? Music, drinks, dancing? I'm sure I'll be fine."

Velvet turned to Blake. "Is she serious?"

"Normally I'd say never," Blake said. "But in this case…oblivious might be more accurate."

"I brought food?" Yang offered.

"Drinks are at the end."

"Why does everyone keep saying that?" Yang asked as she resumed walking towards the other hot dishes.

"Casserole dishes, she wrapped them in towels. The cooler keeps them warm," Blake explained.

"Oh. I suppose it's quite a trip from Beacon," Velvet said. "I'm surprised you aren't wearing a bow."

"I scrawled 'no bows' on her invitation," Yang explained.

"You didn't," Velvet said.

"Apparently she did," Blake sighed. "She blamed it on you, by the way."

"Oh," Velvet giggled. "That's so…you."

"I know, isn't it just?" Yang asked, finding a spot to stick her casserole dishes. The cooler got kicked under the table, the towels came out and wrapped around each dish, and a serving spoon was placed to one side. "Wow this place smells good."

"It's not much but—"

"No, Velvs, it's great. This whole thing, is great. Gives us a chance to get out of the dorms and remind us what Ruby's fighting Grimm for."

"What _Ruby_ is fighting Grimm for?" Velvet asked.

"This," Yang said, heading towards the table of drinks. "The way she figures it, if not for huntresses and huntsmen, the Grimm would eat all the food. That or they'd eat all the people. Either way, no table full of food, right?"

"I…guess?" Velvet said uncertainly looking at Blake.

"That's…pretty much Ruby, actually," Blake said. "She…think of all the stories of huntresses and huntsmen you heard growing up. She believes in them. It's…endearing."

"Some would say that's crazy," Velvet said slowly.

"Eh, that too," Yang agreed. "But really, this party is why I became a huntress too."

"It is?"

"Yeah. It's a life of adventure. You never quite know what you're going to get. Look at all the options." She reached blindly into a cooler, came out with a frosted bottle, and smiled at the label before twisting the cap off. "Ashes to ashes, dust to dust," she intoned solemnly, "life is a party and beer is a must."

"She's…not serious."

"Hardly ever," Blake confirmed, but she found her own drink.

"Well…why don't you come over and I'll introduce you to my family," Velvet said. "And then there is someone I think Blake should meet."

"Sounds fun," Yang agreed. "Just remember, Blake. You have to take me dancing after dinner."

"Yang…"

"It'll be fun."

"It's…not a good idea," Blake said.

"I'm sure that you're…light on your feet," Yang said grinning broadly.

Blake groaned.

"Are you okay?"

"She's being sensitive about…faunus jokes," Blake said.

Velvet cocked her head, her lips moving silently before she suddenly smiled. "That was a good one."

"It's still not a good idea," Blake said.

"Why?"

"You're…" Blake gestured with her bottle towards Velvet, then to herself. "You."

"You'll have to settle for someone who's only almost perfect," Yang agreed.

"Yang, no—"

"It's not that we don't have matching ears, is it?" Yang asked, wide-eyed. "Or are you more into tails?"

" _Yang_ ," Blake hissed. "For one thing, I'm a girl."

"So?" Yang asked blindly.

" _So?_ "

"So," Yang agreed with a nod.

"That…doesn't bother you?"

Yang blinked at her. "Why ever would I limit myself to half the available dance partners?"

"What about that I'm not human?"

"Again, why ever would I limit myself to half the available dance partners?"

"There aren't that many faun—" Blake broke off and sighed. "I'm being punished, aren't I?"

* * *

A/N: So normally I find Yang and Blake to be fairly hard to give a good voice to, but I found something that seems to work. Have Yang say the first thing that pops into her head, have Blake say as little as possible, and on editing strip out two thirds of Blake's lines. Give half to other characters, discard the rest.


	16. Volume 1, Chapter 14: Reforging

**Disclaimer** : Still doesn't own RWBY, thought you all should know

* * *

"There's one last thing we need," Ruby said.

"What's that?" The look Weiss gave her partner was less inquiring than it was wary.

"Music."

"Music," Weiss said flatly.

"Right. Um…have you ever heard anyone say that a scythe is one of the most dangerous weapons ever designed?"

"My swordmaster might have mentioned it once," Weiss said. "As I recall he also said it was one of the hardest to master."

"It isn't called dangerous because it's good at killing Grimmm" Ruby said. It's dangerous because of the number of people who've gotten hurt or killed trying to learn how to use it. Or who have hurt or killed others in the process."

"Lovely."

"The thing is, scything, I mean, old-school grain-reaping is…meditative. Rhythmic. Sort of like a dance. And when I'm fighting with Crescent Rose I _am_ dancing, in a way.

"Almost any weapon, sword, polearm, phased plasma rifle in the forty-watt range, has a center of mass that is within its own dimensions. The vast majority, a balance point that makes them…convenient?" Ruby frowned. "No, that's not it. Simple? No, um…nope, nuh-uh. Er…

" _Anyway!_ " she said forcefully. "Crescent Rose's is…" she posed as though holding her extended combination sniper rifle/scythe, and then waved her left hand about, "out here somewhere. She doesn't balance within herself. So when we fight, we're both moving about our common point of balance. Which is what dancing is…I think."

Weiss shook her head. "That _almost_ makes sense without explaining anything at all."

"My _point_ is that dancing and smithing both need a sense of rhythm. And so…music."

"I'm certain I don't want to listen to whatever you listen to."

"Not even _Weiss Schnee's Greatest Hits_?" Ruby asked as she tapped away at her scroll.

"No such album exists."

"But if it did?"

"It doesn't."

"Good thing I put together a mix-tape of all your best singles then."

"You didn't," Weiss said, more than a little horrified.

"So totally did. Want to hea—"

"I _certainly_ don't want to listen to myself," Weiss said firmly.

"Good."

Weiss blinked. "What?"

"I don't want to listen to you either," Ruby shrugged.

"Why you-you..."

Ruby giggled as Weiss sputtered in fury. "Not for this. You need something with a lot more rhythm to it. Something that you can swing a scythe or hammer to.

"Mom used to collect old stories. Myths, fairy tales, things like that."

Weiss blinked at the sudden non-sequitur. "As interesting as that is…"

"Well, she found this poem that predates the Kingdoms, about a culture that lived under mountains to protect themselves from Grimm and became great craftsmen and miners."

"What happened to them?" Weiss asked.

"They woke a Grimm living deep under the mountains and it ate most of them."

"Lovely," Weiss said distastefully.

"Eh, a lot of old tales end that way," Ruby shrugged. "I know I have a recording… Here it is."

Weiss braced herself for a poorly made amateur recording, but instead pouring from the scroll was a low-voiced _a cappella_ assemble with a strong lead, rhythmic bass, and additional voices filling out the chords and sweeping into polyphonic supports. It was by any measure well-mixed and well-produced.

" _The world was new, the mountains young, the moon in the sky still was one…_ "

It was…enthralling. Even when she was free to choose her pieces, she had been forced to choose from only the best pieces by the most well-known composers. This was older, a more…primal kind of music.

Her father would have _hated_ it, which had its own attraction of course.

Weiss abruptly turned to the forge, pulling out the practice bar of iron. "Ruby?"

"Yes?" Ruby asked uncertainly.

"Play it again."

* * *

 _You know, I'm not convinced this was one of your better ideas._

Since you're in the middle of a crowded marketplace your reply is purely mental. 'I don't see you offering an alternative.'

 _Just because I don't have an alternative doesn't mean there's a better one. I know. You could go to Ozpin_.

'Pass.'

Over the years you've developed a love-hate relationship with Kuo Kuana. On one hand it had been both emblem and symptom of just how fucked up the world had gotten. On the other, for few years at least, it had been one of the few truly safe havens for you and your friends.

Until it wasn't, anyway.

Walking through it now, it would've been hard to imagine the city without its crowds of bustling people if you hadn't lived through it. As it was, it was a very…surreal experience. Everyone was so…happy wasn't quite the right word. Relaxed. Free?

You watch a small horde of kids bustle through, seemingly unaware that there might be anything to be wary of. Then stop at a vendor for skewers of roasted fish. Cuisine was the closest thing Menagerie had to a national past-time. Probably not surprising when a culture starts with not much more than what settlers can bring with them from their former homes. Eighty years of evolution had distilled what was delicious from the four kingdoms, combined it with abundant sea life, exotic tropical fruits, more common terrestrial fauna, and synthesized a blend of sight, smell, and taste that was purely Menagerie.

In a way, it was like coming home.

 _You also know better than to order sashimi from a street-side vendor_ , I remark.

'It was one case of food poisoning. _One_.'

 _Uh-huh. You also know that sooner or later Ozpin isn't going to let you take off like this_.

'It's not that I have regular class hours. And besides, the bullhead was just coming out of maintenance and needed a check-flight.'

 _Halfway around the world?_

'Shut up, Amy,' you snark as you knock on the door.

A moment later the door opens and Kali Belladonna looks up at you. "Can I help you?"

It takes you a moment to remember where you are. This is Kali Belladonna in her prime, before tragedy and heartache had had a chance to beat her down.

Which makes her one of the single most dangerous people on the planet. Fortunately it takes a lot to drive her to violence. The White Fang burning down her home, trying to kill her and Ghira, and attempting to kidnap her daughter hadn't even managed it. Not fully. Not the way the—

"Can I help you?" she asks again.

"Sorry," you say. "My name is Vala bar-Adama. I am a Professor at Beacon Academy. And if you are Kali Belladonna, I certainly hope that you can."

She manages to contain her curiosity long enough to get you both sitting down and is serving tea when Ghira walks in.

"I'm Ghira," he says brusquely. "Kali said you're a professor at Beacon?"

"That's right."

"Sugar? Cream?"

It's not coffee but… "Black, please," you say, picking up a lump of sugar.

Her ears cock in a question as you accept the teacup and saucer, to which you reply by holding the sugar between your teeth and sipping the tea through it.

"Excellent tea," you say, setting the sugar cube on the saucer.

"I've never seen it taken that way," Ghira comments.

"It's Vacuoan. From deep in the desert." Deeper than Sun ever lived. Deeper than most of the nomads willingly go. Remote enough that you were able to escape and find peace.

Briefly.

You've come to the realization over the years that peace has an allergy to you, and it doesn't really matter what face you're wearing or what you are calling yourself.

"Is Blake okay?" Kali asks suddenly.

"She's fine. Fine-ish. Growing up fast, which is normal. Perhaps having a somewhat harder time than normal, which is to be expected since she has rather more…history than most first-year students. But I'm not particularly worried about that. She has a good partner, and a good team around her."

"If you aren't worried, why are you here?" Ghira asks.

"Sienna Khan sent Blake a message requesting a meeting."

" _What?_ "

"That is…ungood."

You aren't sure which is the worse sign, Kali losing her composure, or Ghira slipping into a more…modern colloquialism.

"Is she a threat to my students?" you ask.

"I would have said never," Ghira said. "I also would have said she wouldn't contact Blake, though. How much do you know about Sienna and the White Fang?"

"The names, some of the actions. Perhaps you should start at the beginning and assume I know nothing?"

 _At least that way you won't have to scramble to explain how you know what you_ do _know_ , I observe.

'Shut up, Amy.'

"There's too much," Ghira said. "Where do I even begin. Jacques, I suppose. Or the Great War. Faunus spent long enough bleeding for humans so they 'gifted' us with this happy little island. Cleared out the worst of the Grimm over a tiny part of it, threw up some buildings, and then ran into some of the more…exotic wildlife and Grimm and suddenly had enough so they went home. Don't get me wrong. I love Menagerie. But it's far from large enough to support all the faunus in the world.

"That brings us to the Schnee Dust Company. Nicholas Schnee was a good man. A good _person_. His son-in-law is…not."

"A considerable understatement."

"Oh?" he asks.

You nod slightly. "One of my other first year students is his daughter, Weiss."

"Oh." Kali chuckles. "Oh my. That must make classes…interesting."

You let a small smile curl your lips. "You have no idea. But it is, perhaps, a story I should let Blake tell."

"You think she will?" Kali asked. "The last time we spoke…" she shook her head.

"I have every reason to believe she will," you reply. She certainly did in the past; there is no reason to think she wouldn't in the future. "When she will be ready to is more than I can say."

"Of course," she said.

"What Jacques did to cement control of the SDC hurt a lot of people," Ghira said. "Many of them were his employees."

"Faunus?" you can see where this is starting to go.

"Among others," Ghira nods. "But they were…easy to blame. Easy to rally others against. Their protests in particular hurt his takeover. Some have suggested that they actively threatened the SDC. Not with violence, but that their protests could have harmed the company enough to send it into bankruptcy. Atlas, especially the military, needed the SDC. More specifically, they needed the SDC's Dust, and Jacques was able to manipulate the Council into going to war."

"The Faunus Rights Revolution," you say.

"That's one name for it," Ghira said.

"The Great Deal of Stupidity," Kali said.

"And that's another," Ghira agreed. "By the time it was over, Jacques was firmly in control of both the SDC and the world's Dust supply. As little as they wanted to admit it, Atlas' military was dependent on him. Which brings us to the White Fang."

"It took Jacques time to…change Nicholas' policies," Kali said. "Not that we recognized what he was doing at the time. That's why the White Fang was initially formed as an educational organization. I know some faunus want to be treated by humans the way humans treat each other. That kind of equality is…counterproductive."

'It's _what_?'

 _No need to shout. I'm right here, remember?_

'But she just said… That can't be right.'

"How so?" you manage to ask without sounding nearly so shocked.

"We aren't human," Kali said. "We may look…mostly human, some of us more so than others. But it would be foolish to ignore the fact that physiologically, and mentally, we are not human. I'd much rather have respect; end the prejudice, bigotry, and hatred; and clean up the exploitive practices than be considered…human.

"Especially once you consider how humans treat other humans."

"What we want, how we define 'equality', has always been something White Fang struggled to communicate effectively," Ghira said. "The broad strokes, yes. The nuance, however, has been largely lost. Not just to humanity, but to other faunus, including those actually part of the White Fang.

"Unfortunately, while it quickly became apparent that while some appreciated our…educational outreach, that outreach was nowhere near as extensive or as effective as we might have wished. It also became clear that education alone wasn't enough. Far too many didn't want to be educated, or were too invested in not being educated. Something more prominent in the minds and hearts of men was called for. Something visible, not so easily set aside. And something that would sting without the…negative side-effects of more forceful action."

"Social unrest? Protests, boycotts, rallies."

"Yes," Ghira sipped from his cup before very carefully setting it down in front of him. "It must have been, oh, ten years or so ago that Sienna began to argue that my approach wasn't working. That peace had bred complacency and an acceptance for the status quo. I'm not sure she was wrong."

"Ghira," Kali said.

"Then why not change the White Fang's operations earlier?" you ask.

"I wasn't convinced she is right either. I'm still not." Ghira picks up his teacup again. "Our generation won't change. Not for real." He sips his tea for a moment, then settles cup onto saucer with a tiny clink, and waves his now-empty right hand expansively. "Oh, some will, of course. It doesn't matter how outrageous your claim is, there will always be someone eager to believe it. But not enough people, humans and faunus both, in my generation will change. And those whose wealth or power is built upon the status quo are those we need to change and are also most resistant to change.

"The key," he says, leaning forward, "is making the next generation's, _Blake's_ generation's, attitudes different from their parents. Those who currently are in power won't always be. If we can hold on long enough, and convince enough of those of the next generation that we are right and their parents wrong, they will change things for us."

He gives you a satisfied look as he picks up his teacup one more and looks at you over the brim of the cup as he sips from it. "Making children grow up watching their parents fear us is…unlikely, at best, to truly change things. And then there is the problem of Grimm. It always is. Sienna's approach might offer swifter results, but if she causes enough humans to fear us, the Grimm will come over even a Kingdom's natural barriers. To which she argues that if we fear humans they will come anyway."

"Is she likely to be a threat to my students?"

Ghira frowns at you.

"Students? I thought she only contacted Blake."

"I doubt Blake would be willing to meet with her alone. Perhaps before she started at Beacon, yes. But now?" You shake your head. "Besides, even if she is so willing, it is…unlikely at best that her team would allow her to meet the head of the White Fang alone. Actually, they will most likely bring in some friends to help. So…threat potential?"

"Low," Ghira said. "Sienna doesn't particularly like humans. She's also smart enough to know the difference between pushing back when pushed and outright escalation. We won the last time because only Atlas attacked us directly, and our supporters were able to deny them sufficient quantities of a vital resource. Ironwood won't make the same mistake; we don't have the numbers, resources, or material to stand off all four kingdoms; and dragging in the huntsmen would be actively stupid. Sienna's a thinker."

"That makes her dangerous," you acknowledge. "But not necessarily a danger. Thank you."

"No," Ghira says. "Thank you. For taking an interest. Sienna is…misguided. But she isn't evil."

"Before you go, would you take a letter back with you?" Kali interjects.

"I don't normally play post-master, but since it's on my way," you reply. "There is, however, one other matter…"

 _Y'know, at this rate you might not get back to Beacon in time_.

'That's what the speed boosters are for. It wouldn't be a true test if we did not check out _all_ of the bullhead's capabilities.'

 _Crashing won't get you there any faster_.

* * *

Jaune's shield came up, tucked in close to his shoulder. The ursa major's claw skidded off, but instead of checking his charge, he continued pushing forward so that his shield skated along the underside of the ursa's torso. At the last moment Crocea Mors flashed out in a reverse slash that started around Jaune's left hip, severed the ursa's left-rear leg, and Jaune sunk into a low crouch as momentum and three steps took him through the place the leg had formerly occupied.

The ursa spun, not too steady, and this time when it lunged a paw full of long, sharp claws, Jaune stepped to one side. Sword flashed down and the limb fell to the ground. Then he stepped _back_ and bopped the Grimm on the nose.

He took a quick step back as it lunged at him, the best it could missing opposing hind and fore legs. Jaune collapsed his shield, and when the Grimm came up short, slid it into the Grimm's mouth just as it snapped shut. In response, the shield snapped open.

As the Grimm struggled to remove the shield, Jaune took advantage of its distraction to remove its _other_ foreleg. The ursa crashed to the ground and this time Jaune used both hands to plant Corcea Mors' tip inside the ursa's skull and straight through until it was pinned to the ground.

 _Our little Jauny's all grown up_ , I sniffed dramatically as you step further back into the woods. I suppose you feel that now that the danger is past there is no need to risk being seen by our students.

'Our?' you ask.

I offer a mental shrug.

'He does good work,' you agree, flicking your attention back at Jaune and the slowly dissipating Grimm.

 _You mean Pyrrha does_.

'That was all him.'

 _Maybe. But she got her claws into him early this time and that wouldn't have happened if you hadn't forced him to get help._

'I gave him a choice.'

 _Right_ , I say dryly, _he could have chosen to leave. Some choice_. Then, before you can reply, I change the subject. _Did you notice Ruby sent Weiss and Blake to get Goodwitch?_

'I noticed.'

 _That's it? You 'noticed.'_

'What do you want me to say?'

 _Do you think it's a good thing? A bad thing?_

'How about _a_ thing? Weiss is still working on her weapon and—'

 _And Myrtenaster, the old one, is still perfectly serviceable. Maybe it's a trust-building exercise?_

'Or maybe she was getting the two people whose mental health she wasn't certain about back to somewhere safe?'

 _Y'know, sometimes you are a very depressing individual. Why don't you think something light-hearted and righteous for a change?_

* * *

"You split us up," Blake said. The door of Team RWBY's dorm clicked shut behind her.

"It didn't need all of us if that ursa got past Jaune, and we _did_ need to alert Professor Goodwitch."

"Scrolls still work in Forever Fall," Blake said. "And you could have split us up by partners. You didn't. Why?"

"Blake."

"It's fine, Weiss," Ruby said softly. "Are you questioning my tactical decisions, Blake?"

Blake's eyes narrowed. "I'm not undermining you in the field, Ruby. But I am asking, once we are all out of the field, why you made the decision you did."

"Isn't it obvious?" Weiss asked. "She doesn't trust us anymore."

"You didn't bring a weapon, Weiss," Ruby said, turning on her partner. "And I know you still have a perfectly serviceable multi-action Dust rapier."

"I—" Weiss frowned. "That's…a good point, actually."

"Blake, I needed to stay where I was in case Jaune went down," Ruby continued. "And while I would have preferred to send Yang with you, I couldn't do that without making this…whatever it is you and Weiss have going on even worse."

The door opened and Yang walked in. "What's up?"

"Ruby is telling off Weiss for not bringing Myrtenaster."

"Yeah, that was pretty bone-headed," Yang agreed.

"I notice you didn't say anything, Xiao Long."

"And hold up the entire class?" Yang asked. "Pass. I told Goodwitch it was a team-building exercise but I'm not sure she believed me."

"Was there anything interesting in the mail, Yang?" Ruby asked.

"Meh. Junk. Junk. Letter from Winter," Yang sent a letter in an expensive parchment envelope slicing through the air at Weiss. "Oh, Dad sent us a package," she said lifting a document tube.

" _Oooh_ , package from home!"

Yang popped the top and upended it and a grey roll of…fluff dropped out.

"What is—" Weiss' voice chopped off as it sprouted legs. Then it gave one great shake and a head poked out.

"Arf?"

"Zwei?"

"Zwei!"

"He sent a dog?" Blake demanded.

"In the mail?" Weiss added.

"Oh, he does stuff like this all the time," Yang said reassuringly. But Weiss did not look the least bit reassured, and Blake was…hiding out on top of Ruby's bed?

Blake peeked over the edge of Ruby's footboard. "Your father, or the dog?"

"Are you telling me that this mangy, drooling, _mutt_ is going to live with us forevah?"

"Three seconds," Yang muttered.

"That's a new personal best," Ruby said, holding out a hand.

Yang gave her a disgusted look as she dug out her wallet and passed lien over.

"I can't believe you gambled on how long it'd take Weiss to warm up to your dog," Blake said.

"Eh, I figure I'll win it back on you," Yang said.

"You gambled on us both?" Weiss asked

"It seemed fair," Ruby explained.

"Great," Blake said sarcastically. "That's just…great. Keep him away from my stuff."

"Are you going to get off Ruby's bed?" Yang asked.

"No."

"That's okay. I don't mind sharing," Ruby said, then, noticing her team's reactions. "What? Why is everyone looking at me?"

"Yang can explain," Blake volunteered.

"Later. Much, _much_ later," Yang said.

"This is a sex thing," Ruby said, wrinkling her nose. "Isn't it?" She looked at her partner, her sister, Blake, back to her partner. All had gone very, very still and were watching her. "What? Last month we were all sitting in a Dust-heated spring, naked, and discussing Blake's reading habits and _now_ you're all spazzing that I know what sex is?"

"I am not spazzing," Weiss stated. "Schnees do not…spaz."

"I can't be hearing this," Yang proclaimed.

"Yang."

"La la la la la. Not listening. Can't hear you."

Ruby turned to Blake.

"What are you looking at me for?"

"She's your partner," Ruby explained.

"And your sister."

"And sometimes it's hard for her to remember that I'm not four anymore."

Yang abruptly stopped. "Oh, come on. I'm not that bad."

Ruby rolled her eyes. "Six then." She turned back to Blake. "Want to come down and say hi to Zwei?"

"No."

"Okay," Ruby said. "That's okay. And you don't need to worry about him going near your stuff."

"Yeah. Right."

"He won't do anything to upset you," Yang said in a soft voice that lacked much of her normal exuberance. "He's trained that way."

"What do you mean, 'trained,'" Weiss asked.

"Zwei is a certified huntsman support canine," Yang said. "Which means being able to do search and rescue _and_ both detect and hunt Grimm."

"He _is_ cute," Weiss said, sitting on her bed. She patted it, and Zwei jumped up. Turned two circles, and cuddled up next to her so she could rub his ears.

Blake's head poked over the edge and glared down at the canine. "If you say so."

"Why get such a dog?" Weiss asked. "I mean, you said your father is a teacher now."

Ruby gave Blake a searching look, but then sat across from Weiss on Blake's bed. "There's more to an HSC than doing search and rescue and being a guard dog against Grimm. Granted, he can do that and has. Patch is pretty safe, but not _that_ safe. Yang bagged an ursa in our backyard about two weeks before I broke up that Dust-store robbery by Torchwick.

"The thing about HSCs is, they're also emotional support animals. Zwei's sensitive to people's moods and…cheers them up. Yang once called Eins, our first dog, furry Grimm-repellent and, well, she wasn't wrong."

"We told you about our mothers," Yang said. "Dad…didn't handle Mom's, Summer's, death well. I mean, he was functional, but he kind of checked out for a while. I held things together. I mean, I tried. But then I found out about Raven and you already know _that_ story…"

"After which Uncle Qrow brought home Eins," Ruby injected.

"Wait," Blake said sharply. "You brought us a _therapy dog_?"

"Uh…yes?" Ruby asked uncertainly.

"I don't know what your problem is, Blake," Weiss said as the object of discussion rolled over on his back. "Zwei is soo cute and woveable," she said, scratching Zwei's belly. "Oh yes you are."

"It's against the rules," Blake said.

"What rules?" Ruby asked.

"What about 'no pets?'"

"Zwei isn't a pet," Ruby said. "He's a specialized piece of ancillary equipment."

"Emotional stability—"

"Oh that," Ruby laughed. "I've got special dispensation from Professor Ozpin to introduce Team RWBY to various types of field support including trained canines. Zwei's, uh, therapy training is purely coincidental."

"I'm sure it was," Blake said sarcastically, her head ducking back under the sheet swayed around Ruby's bed. Her voice ghosted out. "I can't believe you did this."

"Why?"

"You know why."

"Nope."

Blake's head popped back out. Then she hopped down from bed to desk and crouched. "It's in those files."

"And I don't talk about them, remember?" Ruby asked defiantly. "Are you going out?"

"I don't know," Blake said honestly.

"If you do, I'm coming with."

"You don't trust me."

"Sure I do."

"And yet you insist on coming with me."

"I've been spending a lot of time with Weiss helping her with Myrtenaster. I want to spend time with you too."

"I'm sure."

"Look," Yang said standing, "And, Weiss, this goes for you too. I've had about enough. If you've got a problem you don't take it out on each other. You sure don't take it out on Ruby. You put it out there, and we all address it together."

"Stay out of this, Xiao Long, you don't have a clue—"

"No, she doesn't," Ruby agreed. "But tell me what else I was supposed to do, Blake.

"You both say you want to move on from your past, but that's it. You say that, and Weiss says that, and nothing happens. Jaune said _Ren_ complained more about moving your books out than you did at the time. Weiss hasn't even noticed when she chips a nail in the smithy. Yang doesn't trust you to spot for anyone in the gym. Weiss forgot to bring a weapon to Forever Fall."

"You think I'm not bothered because I didn't object to you about your punishment for me?"

"Bothered, yes," Ruby said. "But are you _seriously_ telling me that you didn't know how to cite your sources? Because I think that's what I heard when Weiss was checking assignments."

"Ditto," Yang said.

"I've canceled dive training _and_ mountaineering classes," Ruby went on. "And it's not because I don't trust you or think you're both going to take…whatever this is and try to kill each other in the middle of the night or something. It's because I don't trust either of you with your _own_ lives."

"That's not—"

"Don't tell me that's not a valid concern," Ruby hissed at Weiss. "Not after this afternoon."

Weiss looked down at Zwei. "Fair point."

Ruby took a deep breath. "Even when you aren't sniping at each other which, granted, is most the time now, you are both distracted. That gets people dead. Even those with aura.

"It's been a week and a half and JNPR isn't the only one to notice. Professor Port spent an hour telling me how even the greatest huntsmen occasionally needed 'some space.' He suggested shuffleboard and horseshoes, or possibly a bar wrench."

"A bar _wrench_?" Yang asked, making a strangled sound.

"Yeah, I didn't get it either," Ruby said. "Uncle Qrow suggested getting them drunk, though. Maybe he was suggesting something similar?"

"Uh, yeah, sure," Yang agreed weakly. "That was probably it."

"And you don't want to know what my conversations with Professor Oobleck, or Ozpin, or Goodwitch—" Ruby shivered, "—were like."

"What about Professor bar-Adama?" Weiss asked.

"Eh, she mostly just said I'd figure it out," Ruby said. "That I'd learn more that way than if she handed me the answers."

"Amusing as this isn't," Blake said. "You think bringing a dog in is going to fix things back to what they were before?"

"No," Ruby said. "That, well…I learned pretty early that when something bad happens, you can't go back to 'before.' _But,_ " she continued, "what comes after can be pretty special too. I'm just out of ideas for how to get there. So, what'll it be, Blake?"

Blake slowly climbed off the desk and shot a poisonous look at the…fluff curled next to Weiss. "My brother was killed by a dog," she said lowly. Weiss and Yang looked suitably horrified. Ruby…clearly knew. "William was seven."

"Blake," Yang said. She started to stand, but a sharp gesture from Blake caused her to sit once more.

"It wasn't the first time SDC security teams brought dogs to terrorize a picket line…but it was the first time they actually let those dogs loose. The Atlas Justicar refused to bring charges. He said…" Blake broke off, waking slowly to the window and looking out at Beacon. "He said no jury would convict someone for a dog defending its territory against another animal. A magistrate said much the same thing when he dismissed the civil suit."

Weiss reached over, picked up Zwei, and hugged him to her chest. She stood, crossed over to where Ruby sat on Blake's bed, then, thinking better of it, passed the dog to Yang before perching herself on the empty bookcase in front of the window so that she could look up at Blake. "When you talked about the pain we'd done each other, you were talking about a lot more than…blatant speciesism, unsafe working conditions or…questionable business decisions," Weiss said hollowly.

"Yes."

"Why'd you leave the White Fang, Blake?"

"I'll answer that if you tell us why you came here instead of Atlas."

Weiss winced. "Fair enough."

They stared at each other.

"I didn't like what we were becoming," Blake said, looking away. "I didn't disagree with it either. But then…we were moving beyond reprisals. It wasn't just hitting back when hit or saying there was a limit to how far we could be pushed. Others were…going beyond that. And…someone I knew, someone I trusted…"

She broke off and turned, sitting on the low, empty, bookcase. "His name is Adam. He was…my mentor. Best friend. For a time, I thought maybe we were going to be something more. And then I found out the body count he was willing to accept. No, worse than that. He was…indifferent to casualties. I asked once, about the people who'd be caught up. Hurt. _Killed_. And it wasn't just humans. Or maybe it was. Either way, he didn't check first and saw no need to. Saw no _reason_ to. 'What about them?' he asked me, as though he couldn't even understand why I was asking the question. And I knew people were agreeing with him. So…I left.

"The thing is, Weiss. It was working. The outright discrimination was disappearing. But not because humans had changed or suddenly respected us, it was because they feared us. And if you spend any time at all living outside the Kingdoms one of the lessons you learn very quickly is that fear—"

"Brings Grimm," Ruby, Yang, and Weiss finished together.

"So…I decided I would no longer use my skills that way. Peaceful protest hadn't worked. Violence didn't work. I'm not sure why I thought becoming a huntress would be any different but…here I am. Your turn."

"Father is…not a nice person," Weiss glared at Yang, daring her to make a crack, but for once the brawler refrained. "He has a need for everything to be his way. He needs to win. It doesn't matter what it is, he must win and he must be _seen_ to win. Even when he loses he has to be in control, it has to be deliberate, part of some larger strategy… He must have the biggest, best, most expensive…

"He married into my family. He took Grandfather's daughter. He took Grandfather's company. He took Grandfather's _name…_ And then he nearly destroyed his own family and did destroy a great many others to cement his control of the Schnee Dust Company. The White Fang didn't challenge humanity, not to him. They challenged him personally, and then they didn't lose the way they were supposed to. And as he lost control, or felt he lost control…"

"He sought that…dominance at home," Blake said.

"Yes," Weiss said tightly. "My little brother, Whitely…at times something approaching an actual personality shines through. Most of the time he's a miniature clone of Father. My older sister, Winter…cares. She…" Weiss mad an exasperated sound. "If you think I am _difficult_ you do not want to know what she's like. She joined the Atlasian Military Specialist Corps, and I've watched what Father, Atlas Academy, and the Military did to her and didn't want the same. Besides which I—"

She stopped abruptly. "Joining the military…precluded her employment, or ownership, of the SDC. There are…too many government contracts. It would have…created problems. I don't want to watch Father destroy everything that Grandfather built. But I also needed away from that. Beacon offered distance. And there are…other benefits." She broke off and looked at Blake. "It wasn't just your brother you lost, was it?"

"Colleagues. Friends. People I considered family. A couple years ago a safehouse I was staying at was raided by SDC goons. I got out, but I was the only one. I never saw the others again."

"How do you know it was the SDC?" Yang asked. Blake looked at her and she shrugged. "Couldn't it have been the military?"

"Atlas' military at least usually follows its own rules," Blake said. "Nothing was heard of the other people staying there. And it was more of a daycare, really. A place for kids with only one parent who was out on a picket line. I think even Ironwood would have drawn a line at 'disappearing' a bunch of kids, whereas Jacques…Gelè has stated, publicly, that nits make lice."

Weiss stood and turned to look at Blake. "This is going to be a lot harder than either of us thought it was going to be."

"That seems likely," Blake said in a low voice.

Weiss didn't say anything for a long moment, but then she made a disgusted sound. "I can't believe I'm going to do this. This is such a…a _Ruby_ move."

"Hey!"

Weiss leaned forward and enveloped Blake in a tight hug.

* * *

Weiss awoke to something wet on her face. There was a strange ball of warmth in front of her, and her back was pressed against something. It couldn't be a wall since her bed didn't abut one, and besides, walls were not conformal.

She blinked blurrily away and tried to swipe at it but her arm was trapped.

"I knew the dog was a bad idea," Blake said.

That explained the ball of warmth in front of her.

"He's cute," Weiss protested just before Zwei started licking her again.

"He needs to go out," Blake retorted.

"Best dog ever," Ruby said sleepily, and…that explained where she was—relatively, at least—though not how or why she'd gotten there. "See, Weiss? I told you. Hugs make everything better."

"Dolt," Weiss said. She started to push herself up only for the ground to shift under her. Oh, that's right.

Yang had thought 'movie night' was an appropriate way to celebrate.

Hence the beanbag chair and the carts with the remnants of more than a 'few' snacks. Apparently what movie they'd been watching had finished while they were asleep because the wall now displayed a menu screen. She couldn't quite make out the title from her current angle but explosions seemed to feature prominently in the portions she could see.

"What time is it?"

"One or two?" Yang asked. "I think."

"One or— We forgot about classes!"

" _You_ forgot about classes, Princess," Yang said in that self-satisfied smirking tone she used when she'd come out on top. " _I_ called Professor Goodwitch and told her we'd contracted amoebic dysentery while in Forever Fall and wouldn't be in class."

"You didn't," Weiss said.

"I so totally did."

Zwei gave up on Weiss, shifted over one spot. "Arf?"

"Can't you ask one of your mistresses to take you out?" Blake asked. "They're supposed to love you."

"Arf!"

"I hate you," Blake said with very little energy. "All of you."

"You know you love us, Blakey," Yang said from behind her.

"I was comfortable. And you're making me get up and take your dog to visit a tree," Blake said, squirming out from between Weiss and Yang. "I don't think 'hate' is totally uncalled for."

Yang reached out and grabbed her arm. "No one is making you do anything, Blake. If you don't want to take Zwei out, I can."

"It's fine," Blake bit out. She looked at the offending ball of fluff in question was looking at her in reply. Blake could admit to herself (though not her team and _never_ to Yang), that Zwei was…not uncute. "I need to visit a restroom anyway. And it…Zwei, is important to you and we apparently aren't going to get rid of him anytime soon. I'll…deal."

"You shouldn't have to deal," Ruby said.

"Maybe I shouldn't…have had the experiences that mean I have to learn to deal," Blake said slowly. "But I can't change those. Better I adapt now. I mean, what happens in the future if another huntress shows up with a, what did you call him?"

"Huntsman Support Canine?" Yang asked.

"Yes. That." Blake stalked towards the door. "Let's go…mutt."

Zwei trotted out after her.

Blake went down two hallways before abruptly stopping. "I swear," she growled, "if you so much as bark at even one cat, I'm going to feed you to a beowolf."

"Arf?"

* * *

Ruby tried to concentrate on assembling the knife in her hands while also watching her partner, BFF, and academic taskmaster—taskmistress?

Weiss still had her hair up and to one side. But instead of the free-hanging ponytail it was in a tight, though not particularly neat, bun; and held in place with a black scrunchy instead of the jeweled piece she normally wore. She still wore white and pale blue, though combat skirt and tailor-made bolero jacket had been replaced with a blouse and trouser combination that was merely expensive. Protective aprons and gloves had minimized the damage, but that hadn't kept stains from appearing, or her face from being smeared with soot, or grease caked under chipped nails…

None of which seemed to have bothered Weiss.

Well, it hadn't the first day. Not until they'd gotten back to RWBY's dorm and Weiss had gone into the bathroom to take a shower. Her scream when she'd gotten sight of herself had certainly caught the attention of the entire floor. But by the end of the second she's taken off her jacket and tied her hair up, and while RWBY had been gathering pink sap in Forever Fall new clothes had been delivered.

Ruby tried to rattle the guard or twist the hilt of the blade she was working on. When nothing was proven loose she set it aside and turned all her attention to where Weiss sat on a low stool in front of a bucket of murky water. An array of stones was on a platter next to her, and Weiss was using flakes of stone, little more than translucent wafers, to polish her sword.

Weiss abruptly splashed her hand in water. Then lifted a rag and used more water to carefully clean the blade of any chips or fragments of stone, before using a second rag to dry it. A third rag, drizzled with oil, quickly wiped it down to protect against rust. "It's not the same," Weiss said critically.

And it wasn't, Ruby reflected, though to untrained eyes it might appear so. But the changes went beyond the full tang, or that two of the guards were beaten out of the same bar-stock as the blade and tang, or that the other two had been wielded into place. _This_ Myrtenaster was longer, just a tad wider measured from edge-to-spine. There was a bit more heft to it. Its edge was sharper, and Weiss had sharpened the first third or so of its spine.

The inlay work was better, not only in execution or design (and far better than Ruby had hoped, it seemed as though Weiss had more than a little artistry in her soul), but it…was just so much more _Weiss_ than her old sword. Runes powerful enough to make Ruby's molars ache had been etched into the blade before it had all been sanded down and polished to a mirror brightness. Ruby was not at all certain what it would take to bring those runes to life once more, and she was only somewhat less than certain that she never wanted to find out.

There was a beauty to the blade. It didn't show the temper in the old Mistrali fashion, or the rippling pattern like the dunes of the Sea of Sand that Vacuoan blades were famous for. But there was beauty in the blade that was clean and clear of purpose and had no need of further adornment, and that the engraving on the hilt and guard were needed to match the beauty of that polished steel.

"Even if you'd made the first one," Ruby said, "you aren't the same person now as you were then."

Weiss looked up at her.

"More to the point. This one was made by you. Or, if it helps, it was made by your aura. In a very real way your soul helped to forge a blade that is perfect for you."

"Does that mean I'm going to need to do this again every few years?" Weiss asked.

"Uh, yes and no?" Ruby asked. "Sorry," she said quickly. "I don't mean to be ob, ob-uh-something."

Weiss snorted. "Obtuse?"

"Sure, that," Ruby agreed. "I mean, I tinker with Crescent Rose because…I like tinkering with Crescent Rose. I even made a flamethrower for her but Yang won't let me use it anymore."

"With good reason, I would think," Weiss said.

"Yeah, it's a long story. _Anyway_. Part of it is that I like tinkering, and, yes, because I'm growing. But also, Myrtenaster is a classic design. And she's, um, simple—"

"Ruby," Weiss growled.

"Not that that's a bad thing!" Ruby said quickly. "Uh, far from it. I mean…Crescent Rose can grow mechanically. I can find a better scope that works with her, or maybe in the future she'll grow to a different caliber. I don't know that she will, but I also don't know that she won't. Myrtenaster can't do that, but she isn't _supposed_ to grow like that. In a way that makes her more…something."

"You're still being obtuse," Weiss said.

"Um…" Ruby frowned. This was hard. Not the weapons, she got them the way Blake got being all sneaky. Explaining what she simply knew to Weiss reminded her of the half-panicked look Blake had gotten when Yang asked her to teach her how to be sneaky so she could play a prank on Professor Goodwitch. "Okay. Crescent Rose can grow mechanically. That won't necessarily make her a better weapon in the future, just suited to the person I'll be _then_."

Weiss nodded.

"And Myrtenaster can't do that."

"So I'll need to make a new one every time I undergo a life-altering experience," Weiss said.

"No," Ruby said. "The old Myrtenaster was a lump of steel. A highly functional one, yes. But it was never anything…more. Maybe in a thousand years it could be, if used by enough people, sort of like Crocea Mors, but not in your great-grandchildren's lifetimes, uh, if you ever have any, I mean."

"Thank you," Weiss said dryly.

"But this Myrtenaster isn't just a lump of steel," Ruby went on. "She's also part…you. And whenever you undergo a…um, life-altering experience, she'll undergo it too. Just like Crescent Rose will go with me, or Magnhilde will Nora. I don't know how that'll work, or what she'll, uh, change into. Nobody sees the future, not for real. But…now that you know what a proper weapon feels like, you'll know if you need to make a new one, or need to make more, um, physical alterations."

Ruby half-flinched as Weiss, instead of replying, turned away and went to a worktable where the last of Myrtenaster's parts waited. She'd never asked, but the cylinder of Weiss' first sword was way overengineered for something designed to carry Dust. A fair amount of protection made sense of course, but nothing its size was going to contain the explosion of even one vial suddenly detonating.

The new cylinder held seven vials, not six, and there was a central ring-shaped chamber that Ruby was pretty sure could be used to pre-mix several types of Dust together. Instead of a single block, Weiss had machined it into a dozen pieces—six pins, and a half-dozen larger pieces—that fit together like a three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle. Weiss carefully assembled these, spinning the cylinder to make sure it functioned smoothly, but also locked in place securely.

Satisfied, she turned to the final piece on the bench, a cylindrical cage of twisted wire. Weiss picked a pen-shaped device that used thunder Dust to create an electro-static discharge. She touched the tip to the wire cage and it slowly unwound into a flat mesh sheet.

Weiss took this, worked it between the prongs of Mrtenaster's guard, aligning the metal lattice with grooves cut into the Dust cylinder. She summoned a bind glyph, much like the one she had used weeks before to hold an aim the improvised slingshot Ruby had used to give herself enough momentum to kill the Giant Nevermore at Initiation, at each end of the cylinder, and dropped the device generating the electrical discharge. The wires instantly snapped around the cylinder, slotting into the lattice Weiss had carefully graved out days before, but at each end where the wires tried to curl to close the cylinder, they were instead caught up in the glyphs. Weiss carefully twisted each glyph a half-turn, the left one near Myrtenaster's blade away while the right one she towards toward her, then pressed 'down' forcing the wires into grooves, before releasing the glyphs.

When nothing exploded she again picked up the device and touched it to the wires. They strained, but by using glyphs to twist the wire-ends and lock them into place, everything remained exactly where it should.

Weiss left Myrtenaster on the bench, went back to the open area in the center of the room, and began to pack away the stones. Ruby cased her own project, returned the few tools she had used, then turned to help Weiss clean up.

"If I ever return to this room it will be too soon," Weiss remarked.

"Buuuut?" Ruby asked.

Weiss stopped and glared at her partner. Said glare slowly melting into a slow smile that crept into what was possibly a grin. "Want to go spar?"

" _Ooooh!_ " Ruby squealed. "Yesyesyesyesyesyes!"

* * *

A/N: so the music Ruby found was pretty obviously based on the Son of Durin by Tolkien. For those interested, the arrangement I had in mind is by Clamavi De Profundis.


	17. Volume 1 Chapter 15: Just a Chat

**Disclaimer:** RWBY is owned by Rooster Teeth.

* * *

"It's beautiful, Weiss," Yang said, admiring the sword resting on blocks on Weiss' desk.

"You do good work," Blake said, pointedly ignoring the cute ball of fluff that was lounging at her feet with all four paws in the air.

"Thank you," Weiss said. She managed a small smile. "I admit that I am satisfied with my accomplishment."

"That's means she's really excited," Ruby whispered loudly to which Weiss rolled her eyes.

"So how do you load it?" Yang asked. "I mean, since you didn't go with the pop-out cylinder."

"The benefits of a full tang were just too compelling to ignore," Weiss said. "But since I also don't use all types equally, the benefits of faster reloading were significantly reduced. However…" She lifted Myrtenaster II—as Ruby had styled it, for herself Weiss wasn't sure if she would give it a new name, or drop the numeral, both seemed equally appropriate, Yang's suggestion of Aster-Myrten was decidedly less so—from the blocks. Holding the cylinder in place, she found a tiny seam next to one of the wires in the endplate by the hilt, and pressed. As she did so, seven wedges rotated out.

"The wire set into the engraving adds additional integrity to hold the Dust cylinder in place. Strictly speaking it isn't necessary but…it's functional."

"And pretty," Ruby added.

"Quite." But Weiss' lips quirked into a small smile. "They work in sequence, so opening the first chamber will only open that one, but opening the second will open it and the first as well, and so on."

"I get it. You put something you use less often in the seventh, so that if you need to reload that one you'll most likely need to reload them all," Yang said.

"Closing them does the same thing," Weiss said. "That way if I really do need to only reload, number four, say, then I don't need to spend time closing the first three as well."

"Neat!"

"And it's a two-stage trigger now," Weiss said. "The first break releases Dust into a central chamber, and the second releases what is in that chamber. This way I'll be able to generate effects requiring multiple types of Dust as well as those requiring only one."

"That is seriously impressive work," Blake said. "Especially if you only started looking at weapon design in the last two weeks."

"How long did it take you to make Gambol Shroud?" Weiss asked curiously.

"Months. And I was working from a pretty standard design," Blake replied. "Although I used another design to form the scabbard, and the idea of a magnetized plate to hold it was all mine."

"I do have one last function," Weiss said.

"Dagger concealed in the hilt?" Blake asked.

"Tempting, but no," Weiss teased.

"Where did Ruby put the gun?" Yang asked.

Weiss huffed. "For what earthly reason would I include a gun, Yang?"

"Did you seriously just ask that?" Yang asked. "Have you not met my sister? You know, fearless leader? Your partner? Yea high, cookie addiction, swings an oversized scythe?"

"Hey!" Ruby objected. "Crescent Rose is _not_ oversized. And I don't think of ways to put a gun in everything."

Yang looked at her skeptically.

"I _don't!_ "

Yang turned back to Weiss. "How much design work did Ruby do?"

"None, really," Weiss said.

"Okay, so I can believe you didn't put a gun in it."

" _Hey!_ "

"So what did you do, Snowflake?"

Weiss rolled her eyes, and then shook her head. It wasn't worth it. "The cylinder, well, it's basically tension-locked together by a bind-glyph. It wouldn't take me much to reverse it, and if it did the cylinder would fly apart."

"Uh, okay," Yang said as Blake flinched and Ruby looked at her partner with wide eyes. "I'll admit that's a pretty nifty party trick. Might be able to win some bets on who can field-strip their weapon the fastest, but it sounds like finding all the parts again would be a pain."

"Yang," Ruby said. "If she did that, it'd break the vials of Dust stored inside."

"Okay so… Oh." Yang blinked. " _Oooh_. Remnant-shattering ka-boom?"

"Perhaps not quite that large," Weiss said. "But…largish. Yes. That is not something we are going to test, Ruby."

"I could machine a replica," Ruby said. "If you—"

"That is _not_ something we are going to test, Ruby."

Ruby pouted. Weiss crossed her arms.

"Okay~" Ruby said softly. Then she shook her head and bounced to her bed trailing rose petals. "I wanted to be there in case Weiss had any questions so I made these!" Ruby said, throwing back the sheet to reveal a stack of wooden boxes. "Let's see… Sister," she passed Yang a case. "Friend…" a second went to Blake. "Weiss."

"Hey!" Weiss said, frown melting as a wooden box was thrust into her hands. At first glance it was a cheap wood case. But more consideration revealed that while largely unadorned, whoever had put it together had been far from unskilled.

The wood was of some pale cream color with grain like drizzled honey. It was unvarnished, but it had been sanded down to a silky-smooth finish. The only overt decoration was her symbol, which had been set in with intarsia so fine that her fingers could not detect the seams.

Nor was there a seam that indicated where the box opened.

Weiss looked up. Ruby was grinning madly, not even trying to open the red-brown box in her lap. Blake seemed to be having no more luck than she was. A sound of frustration drew her attention to Yang who was now rapping on her amber-honey colored the box with her knuckles.

"I suppose we could just smash them," Yang said, grinning at the horrified look on Ruby's face.

"They're puzzle-boxes," Blake said.

"I've seen the movie," Yang said. "We open them and create a gateway to hell or maybe Atlas."

"You are hilarious," Weiss said.

"Why thank you."

"That wasn't a complement," she huffed.

Blake chuckled softly.

Weiss turned her attention back to the box, no seam, but something about her sigil… She closed her eyes, finding that inner core of herself. But instead of dipping into her interface, or using it to array defenses around herself, she projected it outward, questing out with her aura for a seam. She found the inside of the box and smelled...rose petals. A sigh threatened to escape and Weiss crushed it ruthlessly, of _course_ she smelled rose petals. Still—

Her fingers paused, and she traced them back over her sigil. As before they felt nothing, but there was _something_ …she pushed at it with her aura, then tugged. Wood shifted under her fingers, and pressing down on her sigil released a catch and box top split in two and glided out to either side.

"How'd you do that?" Yang asked.

"Aura," Blake said. "There's a catch…"

Weiss carefully set the two halves of the cover to either side and looked into the box. Nested in white silk was a dagger a little more than a half-meter long, about two thirds of which was a blade the color of milk. The hilt was wrapped in braided wire, two strands of silver and the third a pale blue. The quillions were silver-toned, as were the guard rings that were currently folded up against the blade, and both had a scrolled-look and inlay that was clearly designed with Myrtenaster in mind.

She carefully lifted it from the box and her attention was immediately drawn to a small button located just under each quillion, just right to engage with her thumb and forefinger. Weiss frowned, there was porting on each flat of the blade aligned perfectly with the fuller.

"A Dust-Dagger?" she asked.

Ruby grinned and nodded.

"But where do you load it?"

"Look at the pommel."

Weiss flipped the dagger around. The heavy knob pommel was decorated with a flower. A half twist caused it to slide out, twisting it around and pushing it back in caused two ports, each large enough for a single vial of dust, to spring open on either side of the hilt. The seams were so fine she hadn't even noticed where they cut through the braided wire.

"Wow, Sis, you do good work."

"She does," Blake said softly.

Weiss looked up. Yang held a gold-colored leaf-shaped knife, while Blake's was a black tanto.

"Weiss' is called 'Edelweiss,'" Ruby said.

"Of course, it is," Weiss said, resisting the urge to hide her face in her hands.

"It's a Dust dagger," Ruby continued. "Blake's has Dust embedded into the blade. It needs aura, but when activated it creates a short duration SEP field."

"SEP field?" Yang asked.

"Someone Else's Problem," Ruby said. "Velvet came up with it. Basically, it makes others consider you someone else's problem to deal with so they ignore you. Oh, and it's called 'Nightshade.'"

Blake rolled her eyes.

"And mine?" Yang asked.

"It's called Snapdragon."

Yang looked at Ruby expectantly. "Really?" she asked after a moment. "That's it? 'It's called Snapdragon.' No, 'it's also a chainsaw' or 'it's a portable howitzer.'"

"Now who's being silly?" Ruby asked. "Besides, it has a flamethrower."

Yang stared at Ruby, then yelped and dropped it back in the box. "It has a flamethrower."

"Uh. May~be?"

"We talked about this Ruby. You remember what happened the last time you built something with a flamethrower?"

"It was the _one time_ , Yang!" Ruby protested. "Besides, it was my first flamethrower."

"The deal was no flamethrowers," Yang said.

"No. The deal was no flamethrowers on Crimson Rose or Ember Celica. This flamethrower is on Snapdragon. And besides, it might be removed."

"It _might_ be removed?"

"Velvet and I, well, we think we might have hit on a way to, um…effectively store aura. We think. We aren't sure, and even if we do it looks like there's going to be some pretty severe limitations. But…uh, if we do, we think you'd be the logical person to field-test it…if it doesn't explode when it's charged."

Yang whistled softly. She had the largest reserve on their team, the second deepest (after Jaune) of all those in Professor bar-Adama's class. Cutting out the regulatory effect of a normal aura, coupled with increased efficiency and able to manually allocate power, her aura pool had effectively become deeper still, but it hadn't changed the fact that only way to charge her semblance was to take hits. An aura battery such as Ruby had just proposed offered the possibility of being able to whip out her semblance at time of need without losing aura to do it.

More to the point, she might be the logical one to _test_ such a device, but it had enormous potential. Any one with a semblance similar in mechanics to Yang's could benefit, of course. But it would also considerably ease aura management on long-duration missions, provide recharges to huntresses on the edge of burning out their aura, and provide a ready source aura-transfusion for badly-wounded huntsmen and huntresses.

"That's…" Weiss shook her head. "Ruby," she said, "that's huge."

"Eh…" Ruby looked down. "I, uh, sort of wasn't supposed to bring that up yet. We're months away, at best, from being able to say how something like that might work. Building it?" she shook her head.

"What about you, Ruby?" Blake said.

"Yeah, c'mon, Sis. What'd you make for yourself?"

Ruby looked down at the box in her hands.

Weiss couldn't help but notice that the golden wood had a black grain, or that the Ruby's red rose symbol was edged with white. She glanced at Blake, and from the…other girl's look, she hadn't been the only one to notice.

Ruby opened the case and revealed a red-hilted knife with a blade perhaps twice as long as the hilt. "This is Red Thorn and—"

"Red Thorn?" Weiss asked.

"Every Rose has its thorn," Ruby said.

"I can't believe you said that," Blake said.

"No flamethrower?" Yang asked.

"Seriously, Yang?" Ruby asked. "No! There's no flamethrower. There's an ultrasonic modulator built into the hilt that makes her blade vibr—"

"You built a vibrator into a knife?" Yang yelped.

"Yes?" Ruby asked uncertainly. "Why?"

Yang shook her head. "I _knew_ you got off on weapons but—"

" _Seriously?!_ " Ruby snapped, grabbing a pillow and hurling it at Yang. "No!" She frowned. "I mean yes, but not _that_ way. It causes the blade to vibrate really, really fast so it cuts more efficiently.

"I _wanted_ to build in a chainsaw but the vibrations kept making it break. Besides, this way I could build in a rail-driver that can launch the blade if I need a range weapon."

"And it's also a gun," Weiss said. "Of course."

"Um…no?" Ruby asked. "But the blade is attached to a cable and there's a ratchet inside so it's also a grappling hook. So…who feels up to a little patrol?"

* * *

"Why are we doing this again?" Yang had to yell to be heard over the roar of the engines of the air-lifter. Even a bullhead with the doors open was quiet in comparison.

"Your sister said something about a team-building exercise." Blake didn't look particularly happy, but given the noise levels and her second pair of ears, it was hard to blame her.

"Okay. I get that. That makes perfect sense for the training. And for the tower. And maybe for the first and second jumps. But this is what, six?"

"Five," Weiss said from across the narrow aisle. "Just this one and we are done."

"But that doesn't answer—"

"You weren't complaining last weekend."

"Hanging out with soldiers? What's not to love?" Yang asked.

"Yang," her partner growled.

"Okay, but seriously. Tactical decent by landing strategy. No 'chute required."

"And normally you'd be right," Ruby agreed. "But that gets kind of difficult if we have to also land a hundred kilos of pack and supplies. And if we need to jump in vehicles, whether its small boats or tactical trucks or something else, we're gonna need chutes. And that means we have to learn how to use them first."

* * *

There was a party once they'd gotten back on the ground which meant, naturally, that there was cake.

"I see someone's enjoying themselves."

Ruby's eyes widened at the sudden arrival of a man wearing a Vale Defense Force uniform. "uh, sir, I mean, Major—"

"Relax," the man said. "Class is over so you can call me 'Michael.'

"That's not normal, is it?" Blake asked.

"Nope," he said. "But most of my former students are usually at least a little wary around instructors. It puts a damper on festivities. Since you aren't military, it offers me something different."

"Oh, well, thank you," Ruby said. "For, uh, everything. And the badges, those are pretty neat. You didn't have to—"

"You earned them," he said simply.

"We skipped more than half the course," Weiss said.

"And you didn't need it," Michael said. "It's one of the reasons why we don't object to making accommodations so huntresses can take courses. Part of it is for your benefit, of course. But it does the other people in the course good to know just what it is you can do.

"If heavy weapons alone were sufficient to clear out Grimm, we'd have eliminated them. If not before the Great War, then certainly after. It's not. And getting in close the way you can is, for most of the people coming through here, little more than a spectacularly messy way to die. That means you can do things like clear buildings or save people that we can't.

"The flipside of that is that while it is important that you learn how and when a parachute landing fall, just for example, is used—and even more importantly _why_ —it also means that you don't have to use it. You can use your aura to take the shock and land on your feet at speeds that would cause crippling injuries, even kill, if someone without were to try and do it.

"And if getting shown up by a bunch of teenage girls happens to motivate them to work harder, I'm all for it."

"Most of them aren't more than a year or two older than us," Weiss observed.

"A year or two older than you, maybe," Michael replied. "Ms. Rose, congratulations. I have been reliably informed that you are the youngest student to complete the basic course."

"Thank you, I think."

"You're welcome. I look forward to seeing you after your semester is over."

"What happens then?" Blake asked warily.

"Freefall."

"Pfft," Yang said as she stuffed cake-laden fork into her mouth.

Michael grinned. "From ten klicks up."

" _Pfft?_ "

* * *

You've once again gathered the class on the Portico.

"You all have made credible foundations," you say. "And you have all begun to relearn how to manifest aura to defend yourselves. This is more progress than I expected at this point and a good sign. Which means we will spend the remainder of this semester learning new and bizarre ways in which you can kill yourselves. Should you survive to next semester we will begin exploring ways in which you can use aura to selectively enhance your capabilities.

"But that is for the future. Instead let's spend some time discussing the benefits, and disadvantages, of what you have already learned. Who would like to start?"

"I've got a question, actually," Yang said.

"Then by all means."

"So healing… My understanding of what aura did was try to return your body to a pre-existing ideal. It's why we're encouraged not to use aura after hitting the gym, it'd cancel out the workout."

"Essentially correct," you agree.

"So if a workout is basically causing micro-stresses, and muscle formation is essentially scar tissue, does that mean us jump-starting our healing using the interface actually speed recovery from a workout instead?"

"Yes."

Yang blinks at you. "It does?" she blurts. "Sweet! We can schedule two or three sessions, get a week's training done in a _day_ and—"

"However," you cut in. "Like all things it is possible to overdo it. Your skills give you an advantage, one I encourage you to use. But there is a point where past them use becomes abuse. Whether it is yourselves, or others. Anyone else?"

Yang's observation was the impetus the class needed to start a lively discussion. You do little more than guide it, occasionally correcting an error or offering further insight. Yet for the most part you are content to sit back and let them work through it on their own.

'They're fast' you observe

 _Faster than us_.

'Were we so poor students, or was our instruction poor?'

 _Eh. Artifact of the times. They don't have to worry about where their next meal is coming from, or trying to remain uneaten by Grimm. Not only is there less stress on them, it leaves them with more time to think and consider._

'Definitely a point to keep in mind.'

"Very good," you say aloud. "We are running out of time, so I want to bring up one last point none of you have touched on. How much aura you have."

That gets…a lot of frowns, more than you'd hoped for after the previous discussion, and more than a few are going for scrolls and bringing up their trackers.

"An activated aura regulates how much energy it uses," you explain. "It will not, cannot, use more than a certain amount. With the construction of the interface, you no longer have that…regulatory feature."

"So what, we can use more aura than is healthy?"

"In short, Yang? Yes." You let that sink in for a moment. "Natural aura flow is part of a number of physiological processes. Disruption of that flow, such as by depleting aura, can and will have a deleterious effect on your health. Yes, these techniques are more efficient overall in the use of your natural aura reserves. You can exceed those reserves, pull aura past the point where a normal activated aura would stop working. But the cost of doing so, could be damage to your body in ways that is irreparable. Potentially even fatal. And even when you can 'fix' that damage, the stress itself is cumulative."

* * *

"So," Jaune said as class broke up. "What's up, Blake?"

"Blake?" Ruby asked.

"She asked our teams to meet with her after class," Coco said. She tilted her head so her sunglasses slipped down and she peered over them. "She didn't say about what, though."

"Not here," Blake said. "Yang, could you raid the kitchen for snacks? We'll meet up in the lounge."

"Can do," Yang agreed. "Ren? Coco—"

"Fox," Coco said.

"On it," the copper-haired boy said, trailing after Yang and Ren.

"Blake," Ruby said, falling into step next to her sister's partner as Weiss lead the other teams towards RWBY's preferred student lounge. "Is something wrong?"

"I don't think so," Blake said. "It's just… It's complicated."

Ruby gave her a searching look before nodding. "Okay."

"Really?"

"Yep!"

The rest of the trip passed quickly, and RWBY (minus Yang) settled into their preferred beanbag chair while JNPR and CFVY (minus Ren and Fox respectively) found places on the loveseats and chairs.

Yang arrived with the others towing carts of snacks and drinks and there was the expected confusion as everyone helped themselves. But at length they settled down and Ruby locked the door.

"It won't stop one of the Professors," Ruby said, tucking her scroll away once more. "Otherwise, we're secure, Blake."

"Okay." Blake stood. "So…I suppose I should start with some background." She hesitated, then reached up and slowly removed the bow she wore.

"Uh…you're not surprised," Jaune noted. "We were surprised when we found out, why aren't—"

"Velvet told us," Coco said.

"Right, see? That makes sense."

"If I can?" Blake asked. "My parents used to be leaders in White Fang, up until five years ago. When they stepped down, I remained, and was active in that organization up until earlier this year."

"Wait, you're a mass-murdering terrorist?" Jaune asked.

Blake frowned. "I've never participated in mass-murder," she said, hesitated, shrugged, "terrorist…I suppose depends on your point of view."

"You're okay with this, Schnee?" Coco asked, peering over her sunglasses at Weiss.

"'Okay' is stretching it, Adel," Weiss said in a matching tone. "But I am aware of Blake's…previous loyalties. I trust Blake. And while we are throwing around labels, my father's behavior towards the SDC's faunus employees has been…atrocious. And I think I am close enough to the matter to use the adjective both accurately and with some authority."

Coco slid her sunglasses back up. "Continue."

"My parents' policies were…decidedly non-violent," Blake said. "The leader who took over after they stepped down advocated a more…proactive stance."

"Active aggression," Velvet said.

"Where necessary, where some _think_ necessary, yes," Blake agreed. "To…inform humans that there was a limit to how far we could be pushed before we'd start pushing back. That was my understanding of her policy, anyway. It might even be what was intended."

"Might be?" Pyrrha asked.

"The White Fang is neither monolithic nor homogenous," Blake said. "There are…factions. Some of them are ideologically driven. Others, by local conditions. The tactics employed in Atlas against the SDC are hardly suitable for use in Vacuo where the Dust extraction operations are…very different, if still heavily influenced by…SDC's current CEO.

"Likewise, the White Fang's leader can determine how to implement policy, but cannot set policy. But execution of policy usually rests with local leaders."

"It's a cellular network?" Ren asked.

"Yes and no," Blake said. "White Fang has always embraced team-centric activities, though how those were implemented differed wildly, even within an area as small as a city. During what I suppose could be called White Fang's civil disobedience phase, there were teams that specialized in a particular company or type of environment. For example, diners, and substandard (rather than outright denial) of service respectively. Or teams might be more narrowly focused by task; one would organize a picket, another a boycott of the company being picketed, while a third handled media.

"It was constantly evolving, and that made it easy for some teams to…start employing more clandestine activities. The local leaders may or may not be aware, or even have control, of teams in their area. Not…authoritative control, at least.

"That sounds disorganized enough that it'd be easy for security forces to run roughshod over," Coco observed. "Obviously that hasn't happened."

"Obviously," Blake agreed hollowly. "What I think has happened is that the original organization developed to meet local needs, and so had different structures, policies, methods of operation. The shift from education to active protest organization caused those local organizations to evolve."

"And the shift to using violence caused further evolution," Weiss said.

"Yes," Blake agreed. "Certain groups, most of them not governmental, tried to crack down on the White Fang at various times. Some had more success than others."

"What worked against one cell, would not work against another because of the differences?" Yatsuhashi asked.

"It's a little more complicated than that, but essentially," Blake agreed. "There was always some movement of people around. That allowed for a fairly effective information sharing. A group in Vacuo might now how SDC security teams had hit an Atlas group and find ways to improve their security based on it."

"This only happened in the last five years?" Pyrrha asked.

Blake looked at her.

"It just…sounds like this has been happening a lot longer?"

"It's complicated," Blake said. "Some people within the SDC weren't appreciative of White Fang's efforts. Okay, to be fair, I doubt any business is particularly thrilled when a picket line appears in front of their business and commercials in vids and the papers start calling for boycotts. The SDC was…less appreciative than most. And, as long as they weren't too blatant about it, the Atlas Council and military turned a blind eye when the SDC…made its displeasure known."

"The only time I've seen Father even more furious than at tho—at the White Fang," Weiss said carefully, "—was when the Atlas Council fined the SDC when one of its security teams 'overreacted.'"

"I remember that, actually," Blake said. "They, well, no matter… But it did give most of the Atlas groups good lessons in how to operate undetected, and those lessons were shared."

"And that made the transition easy?" Fox asked.

"No," Blake said. "Far from it. Our total numbers declined rather rapidly. The Faunus Rights Union, especially the senior leadership, is mostly former White Fang. There are a couple of other organizations but that is the only one that is truly global.

"However…" Blake hesitated at looked at Weiss.

"Go ahead, Blake," Weiss said calmly. "I'm sure there are things that I won't enjoy hearing, but I won't enjoy not hearing it more."

"There are, or were, two groups that were more…clandestine. One, the Pack, I'm pretty sure had some security duties. The other is Red Claw and, based on its name, it might have been involved with what Atlasian Special Operatives call 'direct action.'"

"Sneak in, blow stuff up?" Fox asked.

"There's a bit more to it than that," Weiss sniffed. She turned and gave Blake an even look, and when she spoke it was with a voice that was just as level as her look was even. "You left."

"I did," Blake said. She took a deep breath. "I didn't, don't, disagree that there had to be a limit to the amount of abuse we were willing to absorb, and that past it we wouldn't, _shouldn't_ , passively accept it. But some were…going well beyond that. And unlike some in the White Fang, including the current leader, I spent a fair amount of my life outside the safety of the Kingdoms.

"Using fear as a weapon, rather than generating it as a secondary effect, is a losing proposition. It probably would be even if there weren't Grimm. Since there are, I can't be onboard with that. Although…to be fair, it took me a while to realize just how far they had…deviated. And until I'd left, I wasn't convinced it was the whole organization and not a few individuals. I'm still not convinced, for that matter.

"But…that also brings me to why I've asked to meet with all of you.

"You see, I received a message from White Fang's current High Leader, Sienna Khan. She's asked to meet with me, and invited me to name a neutral location."

"You want us to break her legs?" Nora suggested.

"Nora," Ren said.

"Capture her?" Nora asked.

"No," Blake said. "For one thing, there'd be no point. White Fang, even under Sienna, has kept its operations in Vale rather low-key. It isn't a wholly proscribed organization in Vale. Not yet, anyway. And if it was, the only evidence we'd have that she's even a member, let alone the world leader, would be my word.

"What I want is… Sienna will have a security element. I want one of my own. It'd be almost as stupid for her to have me kidnapped as it would be for us to try to capture her, but I can't guarantee that someone won't do something stupid. But if I brought in professional huntsmen it'd be too much."

"How much?" Coco asked.

Ruby leaned forward. "We talked about this. I'm willing to extend a future favor from Team RWBY."

"Done," Coco said instantly.

"We would have done it regardless," Jaune said. Pyrrha stuck an elbow in his side, "But a favor is good with us!"

"Where is the meeting?" Pyrrha asked.

"We haven't decided yet," Blake replied.

"What about the Forks?" Jaune suggested. "That park where the Vale and Tin rivers join."

"Public, lots of people," Yang noted.

"All of our security would have to be mobile," Coco objected. "There's no one real good place where someone could keep an eye on the whole thing."

"I could get up on one of the roofs across the river," Ruby suggested.

Coco frowned. "Okay, maybe it's passible, then."

"What about the Northridge Shopping Plaza?" Weiss suggested.

"You're thinking out on the terrace?" Coco asked.

"Yes."

"That…could work," Coco said slowly. She pulled out her scroll, and the wall screen lit up as she began to flick exterior shots over to it. "Construction on this tower is stalled, and there's a hotel, here, that we could get a room. That gives us oversight. It's a nice enough area that Schnee and I can blend in among the shoppers, but also low-key enough that Velv and Blake shouldn't attract too much attention..."

* * *

"We're entering the terrace now," Yang's voice said into Ruby's ear.

Crescent Rose had a bipod that Ruby rarely used, but now it would keep from cutting a hole in the floor of the hotel which would no doubt make management happy. Now Ruby shifted her weapon to sweep over the doors of the shopping plaza and—

"Okay, I have you now," Ruby said. "What kept you?"

"A Dust store a half-klick south of the Plaza was robbed last night," Blake replied. "They were speculating it was the White Fang."

Weiss' silence over the commlink spoke volumes.

"It could be that Torchwick guy I ran into months ago," Ruby noted. "They never got him. What would the White Fang need that much Dust for anyway?"

"To blow something up, no doubt," Weiss said.

"Yes but…Dust stores have been getting robbed for the last three months. I think someone would've noticed if things were being blown up."

"Maybe they're planning to blow a _lot_ of things up all at once," Weiss said.

"Do you really think that?" Blake asked.

Weiss huffed. "I don't know. In Atlas...I could see it. But to smuggle that much Dust across Kingdom boarders... No, I suppose not."

"You think someone's selling it on the side, Rose?" Coco's voice asked.

"I can't think of anything else to do with it," Ruby said. "Can you, Velvet?"

"If it were only a few types, or a specific preparation, yes," the other Dust specialist said.

"Ruby and Velvet...may have a point," Weiss' voice was forced, but level. "From what the media has reported, the miscreants are stealing Dust without regard for type or preparation. Short of a single energy expenditure, or many, the only truly viable disposal method would be selling it. Though I suppose we should consider that they need to power a tech base with sufficient diversity that most any Dust can be used somehow."

"Do any of those support the White Fang?" Pyrrha asked.

"Only the first," Blake admitted. "I suppose they could be shipping it to Menagerie, but that doesn't really make much sense for the quantities in question. The amount stolen, or at least implied to be stolen, defies rational explanation."

"So we're back to Torchwick selling it on the black market?" Ruby asked.

"It just doesn't feel right," Blake said lowly.

"There…" Weiss hesitated, "there is...I suppose it is a possibility that they just aren't selling it _yet_."

"What's that?"

"Right now they are pulling a commodity out of the marketplace. The response has been an increased price for the consumer and for producers to expand production. They could be trying to establish a new, higher, equilibrium, and once they have enough Dust reserved, attempt to crash the market but glutting it with inexpensive Dust."

"What Jacques did when he took over," Blake said.

"Yes."

"Could they have stolen enough to matter?" Jaune asked.

"I don't know what Torchwick's finances are like," Blake said. Pause. "But _if_ it's the White Fang, or even a radical splinter group acting in their name, they really wouldn't lose much. Potentially people if a robbery goes bad or a Dust reserve explodes, but it won't undermine their finances. What about the SDC?"

"It would hurt," Weiss said. "Very badly. But it is unlikely that the White Fang has stolen enough to be able to adversely affect the global markets for any appreciable length of time."

"Jaune has a point, though," Blake said.

"I do?"

"'Stolen enough to matter,'" Blake said. "What if the target isn't the SDC? What if the point is to ruin an emergent Dust-supplier?"

"Valentina?" Yang asked. "What's his name, the bear-faunus. Fisher?"

"Fischer," Blake corrected. "Salmon Fischer."

"Don't be ridiculous. What reason would those—" Weiss' voice chopped off abruptly. After a moment she continued in a more measured tone: "I can't believe I'm arguing this side. What reason would the _White Fang_ have for disrupting a faunus-led business that will directly compete with the SDC?"

"They wouldn't," Blake said. "False flag."

"You think the SDC is stealing from _itself_? Are you suggesting we're killing our employees as well?"

"No. But there may be more than one group stealing Dust. Being able to blame it all on one thief would be…convenient."

"That…" Weiss voice trailed off. "You _may_ have a point. Possibly."

That seemed like a good place to end the conversation, Ruby thought as she continued to scan for targets. "When we get back to Beacon let's see if we can come up with a map and timeline of all thefts, and cross corollate property destruction, injuries, deaths, and amounts stolen."

Their comms lapsed into silence.

"What d'you see?" Jaune asked.

Ruby snugged Crescent Rose's stock a little tighter into her shoulder. Of the two whose weapons were even less suited than Jaune's to the kind of fight that could happen if this went sideways, Nora was spotting for Pyrrha. Coco was, of course, shopping, but then her weapon wasn't just a purse, it only folded up into one. It made sense for Weiss to be on the ground as well, which was how someone from JNPR was spotting for her. But it had become apparent that one thing Pyrrha had _not_ taught him was how to spot, but then, Ruby was pretty sure she didn't do a whole lot of long-range shooting anyway. Speaking of… "Older male, black and grey hair, wolf tail, at the chessboard," Ruby said.

"Target," Pyrrha's voice in her ear agreed.

"That's stereotyping," Blake's hissed. "Not every faunus is here for her security."

"How many humans would she have?" Ruby asked.

"None," Blake admitted, "probably."

"So then it's a logical way to reduce target clutter."

"Except you miss the faunus that are passing for human."

"How likely is that?" Weiss asked. "And that we'd miss it?"

"You did," Blake replied. "And all it took was me wearing a bow."

"She's not wrong," Ruby giggled.

"I know that."

"There are some even better at passing than I am."

"That…complicates things," Ruby agreed.

* * *

Blake resisted a grin at Ruby's tone as she scanned the area. She and Yang were sitting at a table on the terrace. A line of shops bent in a U-shape around them, with the open area blocked by a street on the far side of which were parking lots. Past the bend of the U was the shopping plaza proper. Beyond either side of the U's shopping-arms, and around the parking lot across the street were office towers, a hotel (holding Ruby and Jaune), and parking structures (one of which held Pyrrha and Nora inside a large cargo van).

She grimaced suddenly. She was formally off restriction, but she'd hadn't even had time to decide which books to use as spacers for her bed, or put any of them away, much less read one. And her third-favorite bookstore in Vale was _right there_.

"Target," Yang murmured lowly. "Female, asymmetrical bob cut, tiger ears, stripy tattoos."

"That's her," Blake agreed.

"Two goons," Ruby said.

"Guards," Blake hissed.

"Minions have numbers and believe the overlord's bullshit, lackeys have numbers and try to curry favor, a solitary lacky is a flunky, mooks have numbers but are incompetent, goons have numbers and specialize in thuggery, henchmen believe the overlord's BS and have skills but not numbers, and underling is a henchman offering personal services—"

" _Where_ did you learn that?" Blake asked.

"Yang."

"Of _course_ ," Weiss' sigh was unmistakable despite the distortion.

" _Anyway_ ," Ruby said forcefully. "They're wearing matching hoodies. That makes them goons. If this goes sideways, I have left."

"Right," Pyrrha agreed.

Blake sighed. "I'm going off comms," she announced, fishing the device out of her right ear, then shutting off her scroll and putting both away as the older woman crossed to her.

"Sienna," she said as she stood.

"Blake." The other faunus' eyes drifted over.

"Yang," Yang said brightly.

"My partner," Blake added.

Sienna didn't reply.

"Right, well, I'm going to go introduce myself to your friends," Yang announced, picking up her coffee cup.

"Should I be worried?" Sienna asked.

"Yang's punny, not malicious."

"I'm not so sure most of our people recognize the difference anymore."

"Whose fault is that?" Blake asked as she sat down.

Sienna sat as well. "Why did you leave, Blake?"

"For oh so many reasons," Blake replied. "I don't like this…personality cult that you're growing."

"Our organization was disjointed, fragmented. It was necessary to achieve unity of purpose."

"Meaning you were afraid that some would take your message to launch lonewolf attacks against whoever they hated the most, unless you grabbed total control of everything," Blake said.

"Do you really think so little of me?" Sienna asked.

"I'm thinking you recognized a way to cement your control and took it."

Sienna consider this for a moment before nodding. "Perhaps. Your father didn't object, however. In fact, he nominated me for the position."

"You were the only real choice," Blake pointed out.

"And we both know why that was." Sienna sipped her own coffee. "I'm hardly a dictator, Blake. Even now. Yes, more direct control over operations was needed to ensure just that kind of attack didn't happen. But that control is invested in the regional, and even local, commanders, not me. And I never demanded someone do something that they were uncomfortable with."

"And asking in the first place isn't its own kind of pressure?"

"Of course, it is. But when the alternative is to do nothing? We live in an imperfect world, Blake."

Blake didn't reply.

Sienna leaned forward, her voice dropping. "Why'd you leave, Blake? You do know how highly so many of our people thought of you. And even among those who didn't know you, the Belladonna name was not without weight. If you wanted changes, they would have followed you."

"You grew up inside Mistral, right?"

Sienna raised an eyebrow at the non sequitur before nodding slightly. "Most of my life."

"Spend any time outside of the Kingdoms?"

"Occasionally. Trips to Menagerie, mostly. Why?"

"I…didn't. Live inside the Kingdoms that is. Almost half my life was spent outside the Wall."

"I know you spent a great deal of time in Menagerie."

"Only about three years all told," Blake said.

"What does that have to do with my question?"

"It isn't an easy answer," Blake replied. "It isn't just one thing. There was a tipping point, but a lot of things led there."

Sienna frowned.

"The thing is…it's working. What I saw the last few years, faunus are starting to be treated…maybe not decently, but better. But it's not out of respect, but fear."

"Respect wasn't working."

"Maybe. Maybe not," Blake said. "But there are a lot more humans than there are faunus, Sienna. They don't have to fear or hate us even a fraction some of us hate and fear them. If enough of them start to fear us, natural barriers or no, Grimm _will_ come."

"The Wall—"

"The Wall isn't any more than an impediment. It's a strong impediment, don't get me wrong. Those barriers are what has allowed the Kingdoms to exist. But at the same time, it doesn't matter if it's mountains, glaciers, or desert. They may discourage most Grimm, but that discouragement only goes so far. Given them enough reason and Wall or no, they _will_ come. Fliers will rule the skies and swimmers blockade the coasts.

"My point is, I think that more and more White Fang are like you. They grow up _safe_. They get used to the Wall, are used to having huntresses and huntsmen fending off Grimm, and have forgotten, or maybe just never learned, how to sacrifice wants to keep yourself and your family safe from the monsters that want to eat us."

"You believe that? Grimm killed more in the aftermath of the attack on Kuo Kuana than were lost in the attack itself."

"You know that. My parents made _certain_ I knew that. But how many of the White Fang were born after the revolution? How many were born inside one of the Kingdoms instead of on Menagerie? I don't think most of the White Fang's members remember it. And worse, I think some _do_ and hunger for a chance to return the favor."

Sienna sat back in her chair. One finger, curled like a claw, reached out and stroked the rim of her coffee cup. "Point well taken," she admitted grudgingly.

"The thing is…" Blake shook her head. "There's too much, too many things. There are more faunus in any one Kingdom than in the whole of Menagerie, for one.

"Last week I was invited to a community block party. And what they had to say about how the White Fang used to operate, how the FSU still does, was…positive. I talked to a shift supervisor at a manufacturing plant who said ten years ago he couldn't have gotten a job there mopping floors. But because of those efforts, he was not only hired, but has been promoted, multiple times."

"I've never eschewed such tactics where they worked," Sienna said. "But relying on them made us complacent. Complacency breeds acceptance. Not just among humans, but among faunus."

"If you haven't rejected them, then why have Faunus Rights Union protests been disrupted by the White Fang?" Blake demanded.

"The haven't—"

"It was all over the news my first day at Beacon. Even _humans_ have noticed!"

Sienna sat back in her chair.

"And too many times I heard that the White Fang's…change in priorities brought tears and trouble to the faunus."

"That's not so!"

"Dust retailors buy from Dust wholesalers and there's only so much stock to go around. When a Dust store that refuses to serve faunus is robbed, it's stocks are replenished at the expense of faunus-owned premises."

"Then we need to expand target selection."

Blake shook her head. "And what happens then? Even if the next wholesaler is prepared to sell even-handedly, the reduced availability of Dust will drive prices up which will disproportionally affect faunus businesses and faunus buyers, if only because the average earning for faunus is lower than that of humans. That's true of any commodity, and it doesn't matter where in the supply chain you hit. You'll trigger a spike in the street price that faunus are, statistically, the ones least able to absorb."

Sienna sneered, "so we should just give them our throats and accept our place?"

"No. But if the lives we are affecting are not part of our consideration, how can anything we do be expected to improve things? And if we aren't working, constantly, to improve things, then what are we doing?"

Sienna started to reply when a gunshot sounded.

* * *

Ruby had drifted back to the older faunus at the chess-tables. Despite Blake's remarks, something about him had grabbed her attention. She'd just found him again with Crimson Rose's scope when his head exploded.

* * *

A/n: So that happened. And yeah, cliffhanger (poor Ruby). Real life hit me in the back last month, we'll see if I can do a bit better.

Side note, I've got two more chapters in this arc, and then a few more to take us to the beginning of volume two, and that's pretty much it. Now, I've roughly plotted to the end of volume 3, but I started this to play around with tense-configurations and point of view and never really intended it to go as far as it already has. So, I'll finish up what I have and beyond that...we'll just have to see.


	18. Volume 1 Chapter 16: Northridge Plaza

**Disclaimer:** RWBY is owned by Rooster Teeth.

* * *

A/N: The _real_ chapter 16. Sorry about that.

* * *

Velvet lifted a blouse from a rack, gave it a once-over before reversing it and looking at it in a conveniently spaced mirror. Nice. She found the tag, compared it to the sales list, and added her share of the contents of the cart… Make that _very_ nice. She still wasn't thrilled with the idea of being a huntress as a profession, but Dust, lien, and Coco still had it firmly in the net positive column.

When Ozpin had announced CFVY she'd almost fainted. The idea of a faunus from the warrens of Vale being on the same team as the daughter of Remnant's leading fashion designer was almost as ludicrous as…as… A former White Fang terrorist being on the same team as Weiss Schnee.

Despite herself Velvet giggled.

Before coming to Beacon shopping, for anything, had been a source of anxiety and stress. Coco had changed that. On her own it was still something Velvet found to be…not exactly tedious, but could be moved through efficiently. But Coco took something to be endured, and made it into something to be experienced. And, more importantly, something that _Velvet_ could experience, which had seemed even _less_ unlikely than White Fang Terrorist and Schnee Heiress _not_ ripping their team—and, especially, each other—into pieces.

* * *

 _Coco pursed her lips. "I expect we have very different views on money," she said shortly._

 _Velvet didn't reply._

" _Past a certain it quickly comes to matter less and less about being able to provide for yourself, friends, and family. Instead it becomes just another way to keep score._ _It is a game I came to despise growing up._

" _As for shopping… Well, my allowance was downright miserly compared to my peers. There were times I felt pinched for funds, but it did teach me how to look for deals, how to haggle. Shifting decimal places around isn't going to affect the basic skill set."_

* * *

But Coco had turned out to be… Coco. Forthright— _extremely_ forthright—courteous, possessing a sort of supreme self-confidence that should have been arrogance, but wasn't. Coco knew exactly who she was and refused to let her team be less, which was how she confiscated Velvet's beret immediately after confiscating her own partner's sunglasses.

By all rights, having her team visit her family after the first semester should have been a disaster. But somewhere between the after-dinner card games and cleaning up, with Coco standing next to her mother doing dishes and trading anecdotes at Velvet's expense, Velvet had come to realize that her wealth was entirely incidental to who Coco was. To her it was a tool. A very useful, and potentially very powerful tool, but it was no more—or less—so than Maxim.

If she had to give one up tomorrow, there was no doubt in Velvet's mind which it would be. Coco loved that purse almost as much as she loved the rotary assault cannon it contained.

Yes, the blouse was a keeper… _if_ she could find an appropriate accessory.

She and turned to ask Coco's opinion when hot pain stabbed into her side.

* * *

For a moment Ruby gaped at the splatter of blood and thicker things across the chess table. Then her hand came up and she slid back Crescent Rose's bolt enough to peer into the chamber.

* * *

Fox Alistair smiled brilliantly as a woman—probably a woman—walking past dropped a few coins in his can. It hadn't always been that way, but his sight had become the best prank on the world. The huntsman who had pulled him from the wrecked aircar had been too late to save his aunt, uncle, and cousins, and nearly too late to save him. Unlocking Fox's aura had saved his life, and had given him a new direction in life. It wasn't until last year that Fox had understood just how rare that kind of thing was in real life.

It had also given him a way of perceiving the world that was, at the very least, unique.

He saw aura.

Everything living produced ever-changing ripples and swirls of color that he could perceive. Against the swirls of aura, buildings were angular, straight-edged, and a featureless blur that he found unsettling, but that was nothing on the gaping absence that were Grimm. And while he had, eventually, learned to distinguish the minor differences in types of trees, or between dogs and cats, the opportunity to watch the endless variety in patterns of people was always a delight…if occasionally confusing. It had taken him almost two months, and an embarrassing brush of Velvet's ears, to realize his teammate was _different_ from the rest of them. Oh, he'd known that intellectually, but he hadn't been able to conceptualize it because, as near as CFVY had been able to ascertain, neither human nor faunus left a distinguishing characteristic in their pattern.

Still, however abnormal his sight, the potential advantages weren't something Coco was prepared to let slip away. Someone who is blind is one of those people that everyone notices until they realize they are staring, and then resolutely pretend to themselves to _not_ notice. It was a particular kind of invisibility, and carried with it all sorts of opportunities, which was how Fox was looking in _precisely_ the right place to witness a murder.

It was completely unlike last year when he'd seen someone eaten by a Grimm.

Instead there were a series of gunshots, the reports echoing the strobes of sparkling light that he associated with Dust—and how _Dust_ had an aura was something even Velvet hadn't been able to adequately explain yet. And then two swirling auras had dropped to flat-gray ground and quickly faded to dull-gray _blobs_.

There were other gunshots.

Fox leapt to his feet, throwing off the blanket (that had been hiding his perfectly healthy legs) and the badly worn and stained flannel shirt he'd been wearing, and threw the cane at the pattern that had just killed two people. He tried to ignore the yellow-gold pattern, now liberally splashed with maroon, that was laying with them.

"Velvet's down," Coco's voice was flat and hard.

* * *

Coco had half-turned towards her friend when a woman—cookie-cutter corporate-goon blouse, business-suit trousers two years out of date, a jacket a bit warm for the weather that didn't match either, and shoes that were _definitely_ not to be thought about—next to Velvet dipped her hand into her purse and triggered two gunshots from whatever weapon was concealed inside of it. Velvet and the blouse—a stylish brown number that matched her hair with a swirling brown embroidery pattern that would be just perfect with a couple strings of hand-whittled wooden beads and a chunk of amber—fell to the ground as the woman lifted her hand that was now filled with a compact handgun.

She was lining up for a coup de grace when Maxim, Coco's stylish and but understated handbag scythed down and efficiently broke her arm. Coco spun on her heal, adding to Maxim's momentum as it came around and delivered a precisely metered blow to the back of the woman's head.

The poorly-dressed lady-goon dropped to the ground unconscious and, quite probably, concussed.

"Velvet's down," Coco informed the others as she knelt. There was little she could do for Velvet beyond a pressure bandage, at least not until she had a better idea of the situation. Carbon-fiber zip-cuffs were looped around the goon's wrists, and a second secured one leg to the first set of cuffs. She undid the belt, looped it at the elbows, then pulled off the shoes and tossed them in opposite directions.

A quick and none-too-gentle search produced additional magazines for the handgun, an earbud, and a scroll running a communications program similar to the one the hunters-in-training were running. Coco flipped out her own scroll, selected a program, and then touched it to the lady's scroll. After a moment it beeped.

"Security team's down," Fox reported.

That was unfortunate, Coco reflected hoping that Xiao Long was only injured.

"Hostile communications are hacked and up on channel two. We can listen, not talk," she added, disabling the broadcast feature lest one of the others give away that she'd compromised the enemy's communications. "Jaune, monitor and coordinate."

She _really_ hoped he was up to it. As much as she wanted the position herself, she didn't have any experience spotting for a long gun, none of her team did, and doing so would have decreased the number of people they had working the terrace itself.

They'd discussed a couple of possibilities, but between Velvet and the White Fang security team this was sounding like a deliberate attack on faunus in general and that wasn't something they'd considered.

She stood again, taking weapon and ammunition (a lady could never have enough of either), as well as the goon's scroll for later investigation.

* * *

For a long moment Ruby could only stare at the cartridge cradled in Crescent Rose.

One that was both unfired and non-lethal.

"Velvet's down," Coco's cool report jerked Ruby back to awareness.

* * *

"Oh, come on," Yang said. "I promised Blake I'd try to leave off the faunus puns, but you guys are faun-y at all."

The guards both glared at her.

"We don't have a sense of humor," the first said.

"And we're armed," his partner added.

Yang grinned. "That's _paw_ -some."

"Please don't," the first sighed while his partner growled.

The party at the next table finished because they got up and something, _something_ about them hit every alarm in Yang's head. "Wa—"

A spatter of gunfire interrupted her, as two of them headed towards the line of chess-tables while the others turned towards Yang and the guards.

Yang rolled out of the chair, looping a hand through the bars that made up its backrest and slammed it into the man coming towards her. He went down as more gunfire sounded close behind her. She stomped on the ribs of the goon she'd dropped, turning on the other, taking in the two White Fang guards who were bleeding out and the goon standing over them. He turned toward her, his left hand holding an odd gun with a nozzle that—

* * *

"Security team's down," Fox reported.

To Ruby it felt like her blood had frozen and icy splinters were ripping her heart apart as Crimson Rose shouted hate. The goon standing over Yang went down, and as she jacked in a new round she wondered (briefly) if she'd just killed a person, and then (somewhat longer) why she wasn't more concerned about whether or not she had. The odds were against it, the non-lethal round was only _probably_ lethal when someone without an unlocked aura took it to the head. But only a non-standard weapon could have dropped Yang that quickly and that meant it was almost certainly someone who was huntsman-trained.

"Hostile's communications are hacked and up on channel two. We can listen, not talk," Coco reported.

"Primaries are down!" Pyrrha added.

"Jaune, forget about spotting me," Ruby said. "Monitor hostile comms, and contact emergency services. Tell them—" How many? They'd apparently taken out—her mind shied away from the more accurate term—every faunus in the plaza in a matter of seconds "—we have at least a dozen hostiles and twice that number of casualties.

"And then call Beacon."

* * *

"The body counts that some are proposing, was not something I was willing to support even through my mere presence."

"I never proposed wanton slaughter," Sienna disagreed. "But there are some that deserve death."

"I know," Blake said mournfully. "For what it's worth, I agree. There were some that I…people who did…horrible things." She reached for her wallet and opened it and extracted a picture. It was old, and faded, but well cared-for. She looked at the picture of a young boy with messy black hair, amber eyes, and cat ears for a long moment before sliding it across the table. "'There are many who live who deserve death,'" she quoted. "'And some who die deserve life. Can you give it to them?'"

Sienna looked at the picture, recognition causing her ears to flick, before she slid the picture wordlessly back to Blake.

"'Then do not be in a hurry to deal out death and judgment.'" Blake started to pick up the picture when her world vanished into pain. It cut off abruptly, but her body had fallen to the ground and was curled in a tight little ball.

Blake started to roll away, reaching for Gambol Shroud and aura only for a boot to slam into her unprotected belly before the latter could swaddle protectively around her. Breath was driven from her lungs. The man standing above her thrust a nozzle in her face and something wet sprayed her as the world faded to black.

* * *

There were times during that first-and-only year at Beacon that you remember wondering if all potential huntresses and huntsmen are damaged. As a Professor, with full access to student records, you know the answer is well less than half. Your new working theory is that Ozpin has, in his long years, figured out how to force specific pairs and teams together to ensure each has an angst-and-drama quotient just below their breaking point.

Your test for this, which has produced…spectacular results, has been to shuffle four third-year teams into new groups, representing ad-hoc teams and assign each a real-world mission to develop a plan of attack for.

You pitch your tone to something almost praiseworthy, "Mr. Frost, you are a stand-out."

"Thank you."

"That wasn't a complement," you say in an abruptly scathing tone. "All of you have failed this assignment. Not only did you fail to secure your objectives—"

"You said success or failure of our plan wasn't a grading factor," Frost said.

"Congratulations, Mr. Frost. You just proved that you were, in fact, listening to my instructions."

"You can't just change our teams at the last minute, change our objectives without telling us, and expect us to perform to task."

"Amazing," you murmur. "Simply amazing."

He pauses.

 _That's right, fear us_ , I sneer.

'You aren't helping,' you mutter at me. "Everything you have just said, Mr. Frost, is _wrong_. I can, in fact, do those very things. I just haven't in this case.

"First, you were to complete the assigned task in an ad-hoc team. You will most assuredly encounter this in the real world. It is called 'working together' and happens whenever two or more huntsmen and huntresses are hired for a mission rather than a team.

"Second, the objective your team was to accomplish was clearly stated. You even have it written down. Capture criminal with huntress-level training fleeing through grimm-infested light deciduous forest. This hasn't changed at all. It isn't what you are being _graded_ on, true, but that wasn't changed either.

"Third, I can damn well expect you to perform to task. This was an easy assignment." Granted, it's also one that you sabotaged by deliberately engineering teams that would fail, but that too was something to be learned from. 'That any first-year team could have handled." If they had enough self-confidence to call in help which wasn't likely.

"Miss Odel," you deliberately turn away from Frost to a flat-out _pissed_ young woman with wolf ears. "You failed, but only just. Good job recognizing a hazardous situation that was beyond your ability to recover. But, when you passed me that note you were still operating under contract and you didn't let anyone know where you were going.

"Mister Frost, you get a zero. As team leader you are responsible for the health and wellbeing of everyone operating under you. There is never, not _ever_ , a situation where it is appropriate voluntarily allow someone to do something foolish like storming off on their own in Grimm-infested territory."

"What, like the stupid dog can't find its own way back? Maybe it should have marked more trees."

You cock your head slightly and smile. "Did Miss Odel tell you she was returning to base? No? You're still responsible for her. You let her go off on her own. That is, wholly, on you.

"Also, you will visit Professor Ozpin and request your team be taken off deployment rotation until you have all taken and passed a cultural sensitivity course." You smile at him, daring him to refuse your order. You may not be able to stop the bullying directly. But there are all _sorts_ of ways to punish people and if he pushes back too hard or deliberately flouts your orders, you _can_ start a motion to have him expelled.

Rules are made to be _enforced_ after all.

When it's become clear that Frost isn't going to continue you nod, consult your scroll, and turn to your next student. You stay away from the plans which range from non-existent to something that might actually have worked. As you pointed out to Frost, they weren't what was being graded. Fortunately none of the other ad-hoc teams had quite as much potential drama built into them, but neither were any of them lacking.

"Professor?" Odel asks ask you are finish up.

"Yes?"

"What happened? In the real-world these scenarios came from?"

You aren't sure whether you should be happy or disappointed it took three classes before someone asked. "The criminal got away when the huntsmen pursuing her stopped to fight Grimm," you say.

"The team contracted to the Vale Police Department decided not to listen to the 'civilian' police they were tasked to, or the subject-matter expert advising that police detachment. The illegal lab they raided was filled with volatile chemicals and a great deal of Dust. The resulting explosion devastated much of the surrounding city block. Sixteen fatalities, not including the team."

"The team taking down the bandit camp settled on a direct assault trusting their skills, weapons, and aura; but mostly their 'experience' being the most dangerous thing around. The bandits had a plan that they had practiced, and an accurate assessment of what was coming. The ambush killed the entire team.

"As for the team doing hard-clearance. The contract had significantly understated the severity of the Grimm incursion. To be fair, the contractor had erred in his estimation, but he had put down his estimation and the reason for it in the contract. The team ran out of ammunition, Dust, and eventually aura before a relief team could arrive.

"All four teams had graduated less than a year before."

 _Emergency signal from Jaune_ , I snap. _Major fight in Vale. Not the White Fang someone else_.

'On my way. Clear me a bullhead and get the pilot a least-time course to Northridge Shopping Plaza,' you order. "Class dismissed. I will be available during my usual office hours if anyone wants to discuss today's assignment further."

* * *

Jaune was doing a good job, Ruby thought. Despite the initial surprise, the huntresses- and huntsmen-in-training had recovered ably and under his direction had formed a slowly closing noose. The bad guys still had Blake and Sienna, and were clearly well-armed and highly trained, but Velvet and Yang were the only casualties Ruby and her friends had taken. Vale emergency services were starting to respond, and they had an aura-enabled tactical team on their way.

"Weiss, extraction team, three cars coming from the south," Jaune said. "Stop them."

Ruby shifted her attention to cover her partner. Those vehicles could _not_ be allowed to leave. Weiss stepped out of the store she had been in Myrtenaster—was that _blood_ on Myrtenaster's blade? —in her left hand, point down and angled to one side in an almost _casual_ position.

 _Weiss?_ Ruby thought worriedly, but this wasn't the time to be cluttering their communication channel.

But as she watched, Weiss' right hand drifted down to grip Edelweiss' hilt. Three grey ground-vans were barreling up the street at least twice the posted limit and Weiss' right hand came up, Edelweiss held by ring and pinky in a reverse grip, and her thumb, index, and middle fingers curled in a very familiar gesture.

A glowing, black bind-glyph just in front of the lead vehicle.

The van slammed to a stop, engine driven back halfway into the driving compartment as the sudden deceleration drove it up on its nose, but the glyph prevented it from flipping the rest of the way.

The other two vehicles managed to swerve in time to get around the wrecked van and the glyph.

"Pyrrha, Ren, get down there."

Apparently Jaune had come to the same realization Ruby had. Pyrrha was an excellent snap-shooter, but precision high-angle work was the rare something Pyrrha was _bad_ at. Ren had at least some experience as a spotter which was how he'd been backing Pyrrha and Nora and Weiss had been made temporary partners. Jaune needed space to coordinate, but he didn't have a _clue_ how to spot and Coco had insisted each of the sharpshooters have a spotter.

She didn't know anything about precision shooting _or_ spotting, Ruby thought darkly. But the _Book_ said snipers were to have spotters which was funny because Coco didn't seem to mind throwing out the Book whenever _she_ found it inconvenient for her own weapon. Maybe because she actually understood what Maxim did and how?

"Ruby—"

"On it," Ruby said, jacking Crescent Rose's chamber open so the live round flew out. She sought out a cartridge on a loop on her belt, dropped it in, and slammed the bolt closed.

Weiss took two steps, sword coming up in a reverse grip, and then threw Myrtenaster. It arched out, landing point-first in the ground and a sheet of ice spread out. The third vehicle lost control and spun out.

The second vehicle slammed to a stop, door opening—

Ruby stroked Crescent Rose's trigger and the hood blew off the engine compartment which immediately began to issue oily black smoke.

Pyrrha and Ren were on the ground now. The former paused to jerk Myrtenaster out of the asphalt and sent it back to Weiss with an underhand toss that had to be almost pure semblance. Weiss and Nora had charged the car from the other side, and as Ruby watched, the hyperactive orange-haired girl bashed in a window of the van that had spun out and cheerfully popped a full string of grenades into the van as Weiss, who had transferred Edelweiss to her left hand after throwing her sword, caught up Myrtenaster in her right.

Ruby winced in sympathetic pain. Nora might have loaded her weapon with noisemakers, but in the close confines of the van even with aura that had to be painful.

"Coco, hostile—"

* * *

Coco didn't much care for Dust-effect ammunition, but ripping off her standard ball was contraindicated in a population center under any circumstances less than a full assault by Grimm. Even then, there were precious few opportunities to let Maxim speak for her thus far, and none of them had she been in position to take advantage of.

"Coco, hostile air-support coming in."

She stepped out into the middle of the terrace, using a thumb to edge her sunglasses just a little higher. "Got it," she said as Maxim began to unfold.

* * *

She had to hand it to the Nikkos girl, Coco decided. The Mistrali fashion made her stand out in Vale, sort of like an exotic brilliantly-colored wading bird in the midst of a flock of songbirds. And she was subtle too, making that air-lorry come down in the middle of the terrace in an area free of people, as though it was all on the pilot after Coco had shot-out the counter-grav generators and that Pyrrha had nothing to do with it.

The remaining goons had circled up in the corner of two shops which was about as good a position they could have, though none-too-good with the line of sight Ruby had on them.

On the other hand, they still had Blake and tiger-lady, which was why she was listening to their leader's demands for a vehicle and access to the airport.

"Yeah," Coco said, "that isn't happening. For one thing, that girl back there that your friend killed? The blonde? You know, the _human?_ That's our sniper's sister. Ruby, say hi to these folks."

A thunder-Dust charged lightning bolt slammed into the pavement at the goon's feet, close enough to raise hairs.

"We'll kill them."

Coco shrugged, shifting Maxim pointedly. "Maxim isn't the most precise beast," she said. "But if you do that it simplifies matters for me enormously."

"Why are you working for these animals?" the goon snarled.

"Y'know," she drawled, "This was supposed to be my day off. Thought I'd go shopping with a few friends…"

* * *

Ruby tapped her foot, waiting impatiently for the elevator to let them out in the lobby at which point she darted forward trailing rose petals.

Ambulances had arrived along with the VPD's Crisis Response Team. The latter were searching, securing, and taking prisoners to a transport. Medical teams were scattered around the terrace, some working on the civilians, others around goons. Ruby paused, gave a torn look towards where her sister had to be, before running to the nearer knot of people where the standoff had concluded.

"Blake!"

Coco's caught her around the shoulders. "She's alright," the older team leader assured her. "She'll be fine!"

"What happened?" Ruby demanded.

"Chemical agent."

Ruby turned.

"Arthur Daniels," said a man wearing the same uniform of white jacket over grey vest and a white shirt with tie. But where the others had red trimming their uniforms and cap, his was edged in blue. "Incident manager. They send us out where there are mass casualties to help control the situation."

"Ruby Rose, Team Leader at Beac—"

"Walk with me, please," Arthur said, turning on his heels.

"Blake—"

"As your friend said, Blake will be fine. They hit her with a tingler—basically a charge of Thunder dust that temporarily overloads the nervous system. It's debilitating when it's active. Long enough exposure can have consequences, but they just did it long enough to keep her from activating her aura, then dosed her with a chem. It's an inhalant, binds to red blood cells and prevents them from carrying oxygen."

"Fast labwork," Coco said.

Arthur shook his head. "The cylinders still had their original labels. The stuff has industrial applications. They're responding to standard field treatment, but we'll run a full profile to be safe once we've got them to a hospital. Beacon, actually. Professor Ozpin asked that your teammates and one, uh, Ms. Doe get treated there."

"Velvet?" Coco asked.

"Ms. Scarlatina lost a lot of blood and she'll need surgery—Beacon's OR is already prepping for her arrival—but we got to her quickly and you did a good job with your initial treatment."

Arthur stopped, and Ruby nearly tripped.

"Why are you—"

The area where the meeting had taken placed was obscenely empty.

Sheets had been thrown over what had to be both of the White Fang guards and what Ruby assumed were the two goons who'd killed them. A part of her couldn't help but notice that two of the sheets were mostly white, while the other two were very, very red. Fox stood off to one side, his blades dripping. Aside from Weiss sitting next to Yang, holding one hand and oblivious to the blood, and a man in civilian clothes was sitting by Yang's head, the area was otherwise deserted.

She darted to her sister.

"Yang!"

"Heya, sis," Yang said with forced cheerfulness.

"You only have a few minutes," the civilian said. "I'm sorry."

"W-what are you talking about?" Ruby asked.

"Ruby," Weiss began.

"No!" Ruby said. "There has to be something you can do."

"There isn't," Fox said.

"Fox?" Coco asked.

"I can… _see_ the injury. The bullet came in high, clipped the clavicle before impacting against the spine. A bone sliver sliced open her aorta."

"I've an unlocked aura," the civilian continued. "I can heal, but only when I can see the injury. Your friend was able to guide me enough that I can hold the sliver in place, for now, but any movement and I'll lose it. And," he took a breath, "there isn't much point. Between blood loss and her compromised aura, we don't have time to get her anywhere."

"Yang?"

"They told me, before you got here," Yang admitted, her voice both thick and raspy. "Dude's a surgeon. He says I'm out, I'm out. How's Blake?"

"Recovering. Some kind of gas that stops blood from moving oxygen."

"Yeah. Bastard got me good. I burned a bunch of aura cleaning it out of my system. Too much. Listen, Ruby—"

"We can fix this," Ruby said, thinking furiously.

"Guy was having lunch, Rubes," Yang said. "We've been talking before Weiss smacked the cars. Good show, by the way, wish I could have seen it."

Weiss said nothing, but her face was even paler than before.

"We can _do_ this," Ruby insisted.

"Rubes—"

"Just _listen_ for a moment, Yang."

"Moment's all I got, sis."

"Remember Professor bar-Adama's class? The Dreaming? Fox can see like we do there. Which means we, or Doctor—"

"Henry Gray."

"Doctor Gray can see like he does."

"I'm not at all sure what you're talking about," Gray said. "But even if I could, I don't think I can. I use my semblance to…improve what I can already do not just…make things better."

"You know where all the parts are supposed to go, Doc," Yang said. "Why not shove them there?"

"Even if I could…regenerating soft tissue is one thing, hard tissue is something else. And regenerating nerve tissue?" he shook his head.

"How'd you go about it, if we were in your OR?" Blake rasped.

"Look what the cat dragged in," Yang said with a patently false smile.

Ruby looked at her friend who was in a wheel chair and wearing an oxygen mask.

"I'd…I'd fix the aorta, and then remove as much of the spine was needed to clean things up, and try to get a neural shunt out of Atlas. I'd also tell you not to expect to get one in enough time to make a difference and that you'll have significant quality of life issues."

"Pass," Yang said dryly.

"What about an aura transfer?" Ruby asked. "We've got a half-dozen huntresses and huntsmen in training here.

"Eight," Coco said. "I'm sending Yatsuhashi with Velvet, but Fox and I will stay. He'd need to anyway."

"Nine," Blake said. "I didn't get mine up before they disabled me, and I've been trickle-cleaning my system, so I'm still green."

"Generally, I try to use my patient's own healing process," Gray said. "For those with activated aura, I'm more guide than power conduit."

"And Yang's body is shutting down."

"Yeah, uh, I over did it," Yang said weakly. "I basically burned down the interface clearing the chem out and didn't get it up before the bastard shot me. The Prof _did_ warn us."

"We so can do this," Ruby insisted. "Weiss, Blake and I will shore up Yang. I bet we can even rebuild some of her interface. Fox will guide Doctor Gray. JNPR can hit them with aura transfusions as needed. Coco, we'll need you to monitor and to tell Professor bar-Adama what we did."

"I still don't understand what you're discussing."

"Professor bar-Adama has been teaching us all advanced aura techniques," Weiss said. "We know how to create and enter a shared mindscape that is unique to us. Since we all add to it, the rules that govern it are designed by us, which means we, and Fox, can both experience how the other perceives the world."

"Oh."

While he was considering what he'd been told, JNPR walked up.

Ruby looked at them. Jaune looked dejected, and Pyrrha as though she were in physical pain. Ren looked normal, but he kept things so deep inside that even the end of the world probably wouldn't crack his shell. Nora…okay, it had to be bad for Nora to look all mopey.

"Yang," Jaune said, then seemed to run out of words.

"Arthur explained it to us," Ren acknowledged.

"We can fix this," Ruby said again. Nora perked up as she explained, and at least Pyrrha looked only slightly confused.

"You realize this has the potential to go very, very wrong," Ren said.

"What's the worst that can happen?" Yang said.

"We could all die," Weiss said. "We being team RWBY, of course. Fox and Doctor Gray could be trapped in the Dreaming. Team JNPR should be just fine so long as they don't overdo the aura transfusions."

"Always so dark, Weiss," Yang said. "Would it hurt you to think something righteous and hopeful for a change?"

"Quite possibly."

Yang blinked. "Did she just crack a joke?" she asked Blake.

"No!"

"Maybe," Blake said.

"I think she did. I think I must be dying if Weiss is cracking jokes. We really need to work on her timing."

"I didn't, I'm not…" Weiss stamped her foot. "We most certainly will not!"

"Right," Ruby said. "Jaune?"

"We're in," Jaune said instantly. "Ah, Coco?"

Coco gave him a cool look for a moment. "This is going to be mostly on you, Fox. What do you say?"

"Let's go for it."

"Doctor?" Ruby asked.

"If this can help me save a life, I'm all for it. But I'm still not clear on what we'll be doing. And aura-transfusions really shouldn't be used the way you're suggesting."

"We don't have time to cover three months of classes," Pyrrha said. "Very briefly, the soul produces energy, and this energy is used by aura. Instead of transferring aura, they'll be transferring that energy. The technique is not without drawbacks, but they are almost all on the part of the donor."

"We've practiced," Ren said. "I actually had an aura transfusion once. They don't feel the same. This is…clearer."

"As for what we're going to do, we are going to induce a state where your interaction is almost purely mental," Pyrrha continued. "Because we can control perception, time will become a very relative concept. You'll also be able to pair your semblances much more effectively."

"Fox and Coco go first," Ren said. "When you're ready, Coco come and get me and we'll help the Doc so his semblance doesn't slip. The transition is likely to be one of the harder parts and we'll only have the once chance. If he can't maintain his semblance this whole exercise is pointless."

"You'll be able to heal her using her aura?" Gray asked.

"They need to repair my aura, Doc," Yang said. "I burned through too much of that energy. It did a real number on my aura."

" _And_ it is a critical part of several life-systems," Weiss said severely.

"And there's that," Yang agreed. "That's the downside of the technique. You can do too much."

"And it kept you alive long enough for us to plan this…insanity," Weiss said.

"Well, and there's that," Yang's eyes drifted closed. "Point is, unless they can fix things, there isn't enough left of me to make what you're going to do matter."

"Then you should go first," Gray said.

"No—"

"Listen to me," he said, cutting Blake off. "If you can…do whatever to jumpstart her aura, focus it on the aorta."

"Why?" Ruby asked.

"Two reasons. First, there's some seepage, and blood-loss is the immediate worry. Second, if I lose it during the transition, and it seems likely, then she'll bleed out anyway. If you can heal the blood-vessel around the bone—"

"No seepage and you can afford to relax your semblance," Jaune said. "That's good, right?"

"I'm, uh, not sure we can get out once we're in," Ruby said. "I'm kind of hoping Professor bar-Adama could get here for that…"

"And if we are that deep inside Yang's mentality and we can't repair it, and you can't hold that sliver in place while _you_ transition, we all die," Weiss finished.

"Prettymuchyeah," Ruby said. "I'm in."

Weiss managed an aggrieved sigh as Ruby's eyes fluttered closed. "That…"

"Dolt?" Yang offered.

"How have you managed to survive having her for a sister?"

"Storytime later, Weiss," Yang said. "Keep her alive, 'kay?"

"Always," Weiss said fiercely. "Blake?"

"We're doing this," the faunus rasped.

* * *

Fox shook his head minutely.

"Are all teams at Beacon like that?" Gray asked.

"CFVY isn't," he replied. "But I think we're all special in our own way."

"It's working, I think."

"You think?" Coco asked. "It's kind of important that you know, Doc."

"I'm feeling less flutter," Gray said. "But I didn't expect it to be this soon."

"Remember when Pyrrha said time was a matter of perception?" Fox asked. "She really wasn't kidding."

"Try relaxing your semblance," Coco instructed.

"It's holding…" Fox murmured. "Holding…"

"I'm out," Gray said. "Huh. I can feel the damage, well, I could before but… We could probably get her to a hospital like this."

"Not with Ruby and her team enmeshed that way," Fox said. "Trying to separate them would be catastrophic, and I don't know what it'd do to the repairs they're making and without them your OR isn't going to help Yang any."

Gray was silent for a moment. "And you think if we cannot heal your friend, the result for the rest of your friends would be similar?"

"We didn't want to admit it out loud," Jaune said, scratching the back of his head, "but…yeahprettymuch."

"I see. In that case, Mr. Fox—"

"Alistair, actually."

"Mr. Alistair—"

"But you can call me Fox."

Gray chuckled. "If you will prepare our surgical theatre, I will trust your companions can tell me how to…scrub up."

* * *

"This place is—"

"Home?" Ruby asked.

Weiss looked at Ruby. "This is your house?"

Yang nervously reached up to scratch her head. "It, uh…yeah. It seemed a good idea at the time."

"You really did a number on it," Blake said.

"She's not wrong," Ruby agreed.

The colors were dull and faded. The grass crinkled and shattered underfoot. The garden was dead, the logs looked decayed, one wall of the shed had collapsed, and half the shingles were missing.

The rest of the place looked considerably worse.

"Right," Ruby said. "I'm going to go fix the gardens."

"You just want to visit the strawberry patch," Yang smiled.

"Mayyy~be?" Ruby asked with wide eyes.

"You know you can't eat any of them."

"What does that have to do with anything?" Ruby asked before she ran off in a trail of rose petals. As each one touched the ground it disappeared, and where it vanished the world was a bit more wholesome and colorful.

"In that case, I think I'm going to start right here," Blake said, finding a large oak and sitting under it facing the front porch and the gaping, gutted maw it opened into.

"You don't have to," Yang said as color began to seep back into the interface, the grass growing thick and green even as the tree burst into sudden and full leaf.

"Yang," Blake said. "I know it's going to sound strange coming from me, but it's okay to be thankful for the help of others."

"I'm not ungrateful," Yang disagreed. "It's just, you need your aura though."

"I didn't burn out three-quarters of my soul trying to stay alive long enough to say goodbye to my sister," Blake said. "And unlike you, they were taking some pains not to damage me too badly."

* * *

"We…" Doctor Henry Gray looked around. He had gone from sitting in downtown Vale in mid-late afternoon, to standing next to a fountain looking out on a beautiful expanse of forest in mid-morning. A double-stack of columns surrounded the area, which was filled with a number of small tables and paired chairs. "…ell," he finished lamely. He glanced down at himself to see that he was, indeed, fully scrubbed and wearing a surgical gown.

"Welcome to the Portico," Fox said. He was lounging on one of the chairs wearing what he had before, only this time with a pair of sunglasses.

"What is this?"

"The physical-world counterpart is the Portico at Beacon. I thought of making an OR, but it'd be mostly what I'd imagine one looks like since, you know, I've never actually seen one." He grinned. "I figured you'd find that more distracting."

"And this isn't?"

"But at least it's not pretending to be something it isn't."

Gray blinked at that. "Do we have time for a philosophical discussion?"

"Pretty much. Time does pass in the real world, but I've cranked in enough relative advantage that if you want to take a nap you could…except that your mind wouldn't actually be resting. So if you have any major questions, go ahead and ask them."

"Why am I wearing scrubs? For that matter, those sunglasses…"

"Yeah…" Fox reached up and took them off.

Gray blinked at the teen's solid white eyes.

"You can control your appearance, but your subconscious defaults to…how you see yourself, and also what you'll be doing. I'm…me, so you get…me. I don't appear with the cane anymore, which is nice, but I'm still working on getting rid of the sunglasses."

"Aren't those, uh—"

"Coco's? Yeah. She took them from me our first day as Team CFVY. Said I wasn't allowed to hide from myself and that she'd look better with them anyway. She did the same with Velvet's beret. I'm not convinced she was right but…I know she wasn't wrong. About the hiding from myself part. Jury is still out on who makes them look better.

"Now you. You thought you were coming in to do surgery, so your subconscious dictated that you dress the part."

"I see. In that case, perhaps we'd better get started."

Coco appeared. "I see you got here safe, Doc. That's good."

"We're just discussing how to get started," Fox said.

Coco responded by waving a couple of tables to merge into one. Then Yang Xiao Long appeared lying atop them. "Get to it wonder-doc."

"My understanding is that this is a…very elaborate daydream."

"A bit more complicated than that," Coco said, "but essentially correct."

"So we have no way of knowing if I use my semblance here that it will affect the real world."

"Good point."

"I…um, I have a test," Fox said. "Maybe. Doc, you feel it when your semblance is working, right?"

"Yes. Of course."

"Right." Fox ran his thumb across the back of his left hand and a shallow gash appeared.

"What are you—"

"Fix it, Doc," Fox ordered.

"But—"

"Just do it!"

Gray jumped, but then he took the proffered hand in his own, holding his right over the wound. "I can't feel it. I don't know that it's working."

"Easy, Doc," Fox said, taking his hand back. "I just imagined it. It's not real, or what passes for reality anyway, see?" He took his hand back and revealed smooth skin.

"But I saw…" Gray shook his head as Fox grinned and put his glasses back on.

"Okay. Here's the test. Coco, you bow out and cut your hand for real. Then come back and see if Doc can fix it."

Five minutes later Coco was examining the back of her hand. "Nice thinking, Fox."

"I never thought I'd countenance self-harm as a diagnostic tool."

"Huntress," Coco said. She pointed at Fox. "Huntsman. We don't do normal. Sorry."

"Right. In that case, I suggest we turn our attention to Ms. Xiao Long," Gray said. He frowned suddenly. "She's been quiet—"

"It's only an image of her body," Fox said. "Yang's…personality is with her team."

"Yes… You said you could allow me to see her as you do?"

Fox nodded, and Yang's body disappeared. In its place was a Yang-shape, but it was swirling patterns of browns, dull bronzes, and thin whorls of gilding.

"I thought you could see the injury."

"I can," Fox said, he gestured. "It's here. Normally she's all gold and wildfire, like a beacon. But that energy is lost—"

"I can't work with this," Gray declared.

"I know. That's why we're here. We have time to figure this out," Fox said. "Look, this was always going to be the hard part."

"Not repairing her spine?"

"From what you said, you've been pretty much stealthing your semblance. Using it for precision stuff. I've got a couple of friends whose semblances work on the same lines and what they've said about cutting loose is don't worry about it. Keep the goal in sight, throw power at it, and don't worry about precision and it'll take care of itself. We've got five people who can tank you, and that _is_ something we've practiced.

"Figuring out how to get your semblance to work in this case? That was always going to be the gateway. We have the parts, we just need to figure them out."

Gray walked around the tables and the image on it.

"Is this image only two dimensional?" he asked.

"It's got depth."

"No," Gray said, "what I mean is…is it only skin deep?"

"No…I just don't usually look at people that way," Fox said slowly. "Maybe if I make outer layers translucent?"

"That's…better," Gray said. "Can I guide you with my hand?"

"You can try."

Gray slowly pressed a finger down into the…image. As he did so, the swirls of color moved away, revealing deeper patterns. "That's…interesting," he said. "I'm not much for abstract art, but I can clearly see that the pattern is…disrupted."

"Can you correct it?"

"If I were a professional art restorer, which I'm not." Gray turned to Fox. "You said this place builds on all of those in it?"

Fox nodded.

"But this is…all you. Is there a way I can add my…say my understanding of anatomy?"

Fox considered this. "Yes and no. Yes, there is. No, there isn't time for it. I realize time is relative here, but it's not _that_ relative."

"Damn."

"Buuuut…"

"You thought of something?"

Fox nodded slowly. "This is what I see. My understanding. For me to alter it, I would need _your_ understanding to change what I see. We don't have time for me to learn that, just like we don't have time for you to learn what I'm doing. _But_ …this place obeys my rules so…maybe I need to change the rules."

* * *

"This isn't working," Weiss said.

"Why isn't this working?" Ruby asked her, then turned to Blake and asked: "shouldn't this be working?"

"Maybe the Doc hasn't fixed me yet?"

Blake shook her head. "I don't think that should matter. Remember, soul-energy. It isn't restricted to purely biological pathways."

"And we can't fix the pathways so instead that energy is hemorrhaging all over," Weiss said.

Ruby frowned at them both. "Are you saying that because it's _our_ souls, and not Yang's, the repairs aren't holding?"

Yang winced.

"It _is_ her interface," Weiss said slowly.

"I've, well, got a bad idea," Blake said.

"Do you think it'll work?" Yang said.

"Maybe?" Blake said uncertainly.

"Then it's a great idea!" the blonde said with forced cheerfulness.

"It may be great, but that doesn't stop it from being a very bad—no, an _extremely_ bad—idea," Blake said.

"What is it?" Weiss said.

"Yang's soul is leaking energy, and Yang can't repair her interface before it runs out."

"Yes, that is a problem," Weiss agreed.

Ruby nudged her with an elbow.

"What? I'm just saying it's a problem," Weiss protested before turning to Blake. "Continue."

"Thanks," Blake said dryly. "We can't repair the interface because it's…Yang's. We might know what the grass should look like, and we can affect a localized repair as long as we concentrate, but if we stop, the repair eventually fails.

"But we, we're all projections of our souls so…what if we give Yang a part of ourselves?"

"You're thinking that will allow her to draw from us, make the repairs undeniably _hers_ , and give her more time to effect repairs?" Weiss asked.

"Yes."

"We could just do aura-transfers."

"This needs to be done at a deeper level or it won't work."

"So we'd…what?"

Weiss turned to Ruby. "Blake is suggesting we graft pieces of our souls onto Yang's."

"Blake's right," Yang said. "That's a really bad idea. Like, in the history of bad ideas, it's right up there with General Legune's idea to attack Fort Castle at night."

"Thanks for that analogy, Yang," Blake said dryly.

"With the upside that it might work," Yang finished.

"Well, if it's a bad idea and it works, then it wasn't a bad idea," Ruby said.

"Oh no," Weiss said. "It's still a bad idea. It is, in fact, a terrible idea."

Ruby reached up and undid the cross-shaped clasps holding her cloak on.

"Ruby, no—"

"Yep!" Ruby bundled her cloak across to Yang.

Blake reached into a pocket and pulled out a battered paperback.

"Do you ever go anywhere without a book?" Yang asked, taking it from her.

"Nope," Blake said.

Weiss made a disgusted sound. "Why is it always me that is trying to be rational and sane in this group?"

"Meh," Yang said. "You know you love us,"

Weiss glowered at her.

"Okay, you'd be bored to tears if we weren't crazy."

"Isn't that the truth?" Weiss snarked as she reached up and undid the clasp holding her ponytail in place. She shook her head so her white hair fell around her like a snowy cloak, then stared at the jeweled clasp for a long time before passing it across to Yang. "Don't kill us, Xiao Long."

"Try not to," Yang said cheerfully.

* * *

Henry Gray was pretty sure that even Atlas had nothing quite like the control panel. For one thing, he was almost certain they didn't have glowing blue stone that could download portions of a person's memory. And yet, by pressing his hand against it and 'thinking about what he knew about anatomy' it had enabled the creation of what appeared to be a hologram that was 'informed' by how Fox Alistair viewed the world. Of course, Atlas had made remarkable strides in integrating neural structures and cybernetics—even if they did keep much of it to themselves—so it was possible they had something like the control panel and had likewise kept it to themselves.

And then there was the hologram. He used the term, even in his own thoughts, because he didn't know of anything better. There was a substance to it that no hologram should have. It didn't really feel like anything when he touched it, but there was still a…density that light and air should not have.

"This is…completely insane."

"Sanity is relative," Fox said philosophically. "Stick with one that works."

"Isn't that the Gods' honest truth?"

Gray shifted the opacity of his patient, tracing the damage pathway. "She was unreasonably lucky the shot came at such a high angle."

"How so?"

"This conversation isn't merely academic," Gray paused. "Although I have no idea how I'm supposed to both write this up for a medical journal while still retaining my license. Highlight the cardiovascular system. Focus on the upper thoracic…"

Fox hummed and the control panel glowed and beeped.

* * *

"YANG!" Weiss screamed as lawn sprinklers came on.

Yang stuck her head out of…well, at one time there had been a window, as well as a wall, on the particular part of the second story. Yang had removed the damaged structure but hadn't gotten around to replacing it yet.

"Oh, hey," she said brightly. "That's great."

"This is great?" Weiss snarled as she began to wring out her hair. "I am…sodden."

"Sure is. It means Doc is making progress on my cardiovascular system. I had to shut off the water because it was leaking down in the basement."

"Exactly how is that going to help?" Weiss and Yang both looked up at Blake. The latter was perched on the bare square of the roof that was reasonably clean and intact, and was, apparently, enjoying a nap in the sun.

"I'm going to use my circulatory system as a pathway for aura. It's not really meant to be used that way, but at least I won't be leaking all over the place, and once I get power to my liver and kidneys and other gooey and slimy bits, hopefully they'll start repairing themselves."

"You mean you aren't?" Blake asked.

"I, uh, was sort of using my spine architecture as a transmission node. I needed help visualizing it and figure if anything took out my spine I'd be dead anyway."

"So, of course when it didn't immediately kill you it might kill all of us trying to save you," Weiss said.

"Next week the lifesaving party is in Weiss' soul!" Yang said, ducking back inside the room.

"As if!"

"Please, no," Blake added.

"Eh," Ruby said. "It sounds fair. On the upside, the strawberries are looking better, Yang."


	19. Volume 1 Chapter 17 Vision of the Future

**Disclaimer:** RWBY is owned by Rooster Teeth.

* * *

Has it really been a whole month? I suppose it has. Sorry about the wait. Sorry about initially posting the wrong chapter last time (on the other hand it netted this story more reviews than it normally does so...nah, I wouldn't do that to you on purpose.)

* * *

"They don't want us to go too low," the pilot calls back to you. "The wash from our engines could contaminate the scene."

"Can you put us over an area that's clear-ish?" you ask.

"Yeah. How high up do want?"

"A hundred meters is fine, higher if you have to. Let me know if they want us higher than twice that."

Traditional landing strategies that require the use of firing a weapon are clearly out in an area with such a high concentration of civilians, and your semblance does not strictly lend itself to such and while it could be worked around it would also give you away to anyone watching. You could brute force it with aura, or let your suit take it. But you have a feeling you're going to need all the aura you have, and while your suit can absorb kinetic energy, it's also closer to max capacity than you generally allow and your resources to repair, never mind replace, it are limited so why stress it unnecessarily?

Fortunately, among your technological goodies is a descender. This aptly, if rather unimaginatively named device is about the size of a deck of playing cards, is rather simple in operation. After being switched on and the person or object it is attached to acquiring sufficient kinetic energy to arm, it will abruptly invert precisely half of its carrier's kinetic energy when an object with sufficient mass to trigger a sudden deceleration event enters its zone of effect.

In short, you jump, and just before you plant yourself into the cement, it twists your kinetic energy around so that hundred meters may as well be a normal stairstep. Even better, it's damn near unbreakable…short of Ruby shooting it with Crescent Rose or something similar anyway.

Wait…no, even that wouldn't accomplish much, darn kinetic energy. Neptune's plasma carbine on the other hand…

As it is you barely even notice as your boots make contact…except for that your passage has given your hair a windswept look you can never manage to create on purpose. Not when you really want it.

A man, a bit taller than average, with black hair and a close-cut goatee walks up. "Captain Nick Wolfe, VCPD."

"Professor Vala bar-Adama," you reply. "Beacon. I understand you have some of my students?"

"You could say that. They're unconscious, with two exceptions. One of them the medics say should be dead and isn't, the other is insisting that we not move any of them. Since the medics can't tell me what's going on with the unconscious ones, and the one insisting they not go anywhere has the biggest gun I've ever seen come out of a purse, I was willing to wait until you show up."

"Me specifically?"

"She's demanding you, specifically."

You pause as you take sight of a downed airship. "Just what happened here?"

"We're still working that. I have over twenty fatalities. All of them look…targeted. Aside from one of your students, all faunus. I also have two attempted kidnap victims. Also, both faunus. And then there are the humans who did the killing and or kidnapping, or provided cover or attempted extraction of the same. And your students were right in the thick of it. Preliminary reports are they stopped it. I need them conscious and answering questions."

Wolfe leads you towards the center of the open café area, to a man standing off to one side. He wears the white of Vale's EMS corps, but blue-edged instead of the normal red.

"Arthur Daniels, Incident Manager."

"Vala bar-Adama, Beacon, Professor."

"Professor," Coco said.

And, because you're in public and this is Coco. "Ms. Adel."

JNPR and RWBY are both laying on the ground. In Yang's case her shirt has been cut away and a large pressure-bandage soaked crimson rests above her sternum. A stained sheet keeps everything modest even though Yang is not a naturally modest person. She's not dead though. A man you don't know in civilian garb is sitting at Yang's head, and Fox Alistair is sitting next to him.

"Who's the civ?"

You ask Coco, but it's Daniels who responds. "Henry Gray, thoracic surgeon, one of the best in the Kingdom."

"Coco," you say. "Explain. Now."

"Yang took a lethal hit. The doc has an unlocked aura, and his semblance is targeted accelerated healing, but he has to be able to see the injury. Fox can 'see' the injury."

"Fox used what I taught you to pull an untrained and unprepared civilian into an instance of the Dreaming to combine their talents to repair the injury?" The question is more to gain you time than an actual request for information.

It's definitely a move that puts him on the idiot scale, though it's not quite as high up as some boneheaded things you've seen people pull over the years. It's also more than a little impressive that he managed even that much. That he's managed to combine semblances that way with someone with no training and who he just met is…scary. Miraculous as all hell, but miracles can be pretty frightening too.

"Pretty much. I've been bouncing in and out. Doc says Xiao Long is ready for a hospital, but we can't disconnect them."

"JNPR?"

"Tanked Gray when he ran low. He's subtle, like Nikkos. This was brute force work and he doesn't have training to strengthen his aura or endurance like huntresses do."

"And the rest of RWBY? Team RWBY," you add. You'd almost forgotten what it was like to need to be clear which 'ruby' you were talking about, and it's been taking you too long to get back into the habit.

"Xiao Long burned through her soul energy. It kept her alive long enough for the Doc to get to her but…"

"She did enough damage to herself that it would have killed her without whatever the bullet did," you say flatly.

"Pretty much," Coco agrees. "They went in to try and fix it. I'm not sure if that's possible."

"It is, but not with your level of understanding," you reply. "At best, they could pour power in until Yang fixed it, but if the damage was severe enough, Yang might not have the experience, knowledge, or capacity to fix it in the time she'd have available."

The question is, where do you begin to even fix this.

"I thought you'd be a lot more upset."

You glance at Coco who is trying very hard to pretend that she isn't worried for her teammate or friends.

"If you want to ever be a professional huntress, you must learn how to accept the chaos around you yet remain calm despite it and only give into those feelings when it is absolutely safe to do so. Too many Grimm feed or play upon our emotions, and too many situations call for us to make rational decisions free of emotional bias for it to be otherwise. If I let myself feel what I want, I'd be so blindly furious with all of you that I couldn't function and you, they, can't afford that."

You go to Fox and Gray and touch both on the shoulder as you synch into the reality that is their shared Dream. It is, or perhaps was, the Portico, but you are fairly certain you don't want to understand the odd fusion of technology and artwork that now decorates the place. For one thing, there's an image of Yang laying on top of a white slab with—

"Professor!" Fox says.

Your glare stops him and you give him a terse nod as you turn to examine Yang. She is, against all probability, alive. Relatively healthy even. You make a mental note—well, I make one for you, same diff—that Gray does good work.

You look around again. Really, all the place needs are a couple of lab coats, a lightning storm, and someone screaming 'she's alive! _ALIVE!_ '

Speaking of. You turn to the other animate person. "Dr. Gray?"

"Yes?" he asks curiously.

"Professor bar-Adama. It's time to wake up." You press two fingers into the center of his forehead. And then you're back in the real world and Gray tilts his head back to look at you before yawning hugely.

"Daniels?" you glance at the incident manager.

"Yes."

"We're going to need a place where we can board a bullhead to Beacon."

He nods.

"Dr. Gray will come with us. Sorry Doc, but you're on a three-day vacation. Minimum. There isn't another aura-specialist in Vale qualified to make sure you're alright after what you just went through."

"I feel fine."

You nod. "I would expect you to feel so. Well-rested?"

"Yes, actually."

"You were effectively experiencing a dream-state. It might help you to know you can do major surgery and save lives in your sleep. On the other hand, I don't even need to examine you to know that you've put major stress on your semblance, one you have neither experience in nor training for. And you've received a number of aura transfusions that, while not as taxing on the receiver as the traditional method, are not without consequence."

"Your students assured me they were safe," he says with a frown.

"They are. That doesn't mean your body was designed to run through five people's worth of aura in less than an hour."

He stares at you. "It was really only that long?"

"Dream-state," you repeat. "And you have no training in dealing with distorted time-flow. That can, rarely, cause a dissociative state, and somewhat more frequently distort your sense of the passage of time…among other problems. None of them are untreatable, or even very serious despite how it sounds, but I'd rather you be close to help and not wrist-deep in someone's chest if you end up needing that help."

"Fair point."

You turn to Fox. "Wake up JNPR. Mr. Daniels here will have a landing site for the bullhead shortly. Get them on it and strapped down."

You turn your attention to Yang. She is, in a word, a mess.

The injury feels well on its way to healing, but it must have been a real doozy considering the amount of blood spilled and what your students have done.

It's easy to get into Yang's interface. Having been there before helped, as is the fact that, in a very real way, you've known her for ages. But even for all of that, it's far too easy to get inside the front door of your student's soul.

"Xiao Long!"

A familiar blonde head pops out of a window, and just as quickly disappears.

Blake is sitting on a tree limb, apparently drowsing, while Ruby (sans cloak) and Weiss (with her hair down) are practicing hand-to-hand in a small clearing (and looking utterly ridiculous).

"Heya, Prof!"

You give Yang a cold look. "I see you did a real number on the place."

"Uh…yeah. I—"

"I'm not interested in your explanations…" your attention drifts to the window Yang had first looked out of. "At this time. Stay here."

If the exterior was in rough shape, that doesn't begin to describe the condition of the interior. Much of it has been gutted, and you hope that is more reflective of Yang not having done anything with it yet than it is actual damage.

You don't need to know which room to look in, you can feel it. You shove the door open, idly taking in the two beds, one with gold pillow and throw, the other with red. A red cloak hangs in the closet. A battered paperback copy of _Ninjas of Love_ sits on the nightstand between both beds, and on a shelf above one desk is a very familiar hair clasp.

Those…

 _Idiots_ , I offer.

"That falls so far short of reality that I can't begin to describe, much less quantify, it," you say in a clinically precise tone.

You go back outside.

"Uh, Prof…"

"The actions you have taken today will have consequences," you say. "Some of those consequences will be permanent. I hope you are all prepared to live with them."

Blake starts to reply but you cut her off with a chop of your hand.

"How did the three of you even get in here?" You demand.

"I, uh, remember what it felt like when you visited," Yang says. "I just repeated it."

"No. You didn't," you reply. But that at least explains the weak barriers. "There is a barrier that normally prevents intrusion. You have practically destroyed yours."

"That's bad?" Yang asks.

"No, Yang," you sigh. "Having your skin burned off and then waltzing through a pathogen research lab that has suffered a catastrophic containment failure would be bad. This is far worse."

"Uh, you can fix that, right?"

"I've never heard of it being so damaged before," your reply robs Vacuo of what little moisture it had. "You do realize that without it everyone effectively has a free walk into your soul? You _were_ in Port's class when I explained what a _geist_ does, were you not?"

"Oh. Well, that's not good."

"And I don't care to contemplate what kind of damage anything hostile, or even just…chaotic could do, especially considering your current state. Ruby. Plan on your Team being assigned extra class-time with me. It seems as though I need to teach the four of you how to safely enter another person's soul and leave without making a mess of things."

"Next semester?" Ruby suggests.

"I wasn't planning on teaching it at all," you reply. "For that matter, I still don't understand how you managed this much with the training you've had."

"Oh."

"Under the circumstances…the sooner the better." Deep breath. "That's enough for now. You need to wake up. Your sister still needs to see the inside of a hospital. The sooner the better. And we can't move her until you're in your proper bodies."

* * *

"You're teaching those kids to use aura in a very different way than most huntsmen and huntresses, aren't you?"

You give Henry Gray a considering look before nodding. "I am." You sip at your tea, then place cup on saucer and carefully set both on the table between you.

"You'll be happy to know that you'll make a full recovery," you say.

"Those words are always a relief," he allows.

"Rest and Relaxation for three days. You'll feel hungrier and thirstier than normal. Go ahead and eat your fill. Beyond that, your aura and semblance were badly strained. Try to avoid using either, but especially your semblance, for two weeks. After that, careful and gradual use."

"See you again for a reevaluation in two weeks?" he asks.

"If you want. Realistically you shouldn't need it, but if it'll make you feel better any aura specialist should be able to do a thorough evaluation."

"Also good to know. Did you hear about Yang?"

"I know that she'd make a full recovery."

"Apparently I do good work." He grins suddenly, "Even in my sleep."

"I'm not sure that boast will inspire confidence in your future patients, no matter how accurate it might be in this case."

Gray's smile fades. "How are the others?"

"Fox will be fine, as will the rest of teams CFVY and JNPR. Velvet's injury is serious, even life-threatening, but for all of that it is a fairly routine injury. The others badly depleted themselves, but the usual remedy for that is time; rest, food and the like. Team RWBY is a bit more complicated. They had just enough knowledge to do something they shouldn't have been able to do. They achieved their end-goal, but not without creating some long-term issues that will just have to be worked out."

* * *

Sienna woke with a start.

"Easy," a muffled but familiar voice said, at the same time a hand rested on her arm.

She jerked her arm away, but something tugged at her hand.

"Sienna!"

She blinked, finally recognizing the figure over her bed. "B-Blake?" She shook her head, and tried to clear her dust-dry throat. "Where are we?"

"Beacon," Blake said. "Medical wing."

"A human hospital?"

"A _huntsmen_ hospital," Blake replied. "Would you have preferred a faunus-run clinic?"

"Yes!"

"Where you could endanger more faunus if whoever sent those…people had another tactical team he could whistle up?"

"More?" Sienna asked. "How many—"

"Twenty-three," Blake said. "Including your two guards. Another five injured, not including us on the other huntresses in training. That it isn't worse is mostly on my friends ending things as quickly as they did. By the way, that count includes every faunus on the terrace or in the shops immediately surrounding it. How many of them were your security?"

"Just the two."

"You only brought _two_ guards?" Blake asked in surprise.

"Unscheduled meeting. Only a handful of people knew I was even in the area…unlike you."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Blake asked lowly.

"This had to be the SDC. No one else would have dared. You told the Schnee girl, didn't you?"

Blake stared at her. "Weiss stopped their ground extraction almost entirely by herself," she said in a low voice. "If not for her, we would have been taken. It would have been costly for them, but they would have succeeded."

"And it hasn't occurred to you that all this has done is drive you closer?"

"What would be the point?" Blake asked. "We're already on the same team, living in the same dorm, and will be for the next three and a half years. Jacques doesn't need to do anything to drive us closer. And Weiss…you've never met her, but she doesn't lie or dissemble worth a damn. What you see is pretty much what you get.

"It is equally endearing and aagravating."

"Go away, Blake. I need to think of our response."

"Don't do anything," Blake said.

"Even your father wouldn't do nothing," Sienna scoffed.

"Then release a statement that you fully expect Vale to handle the matter appropriately," Blake said. "Those that cooperate fully and plead guilty will be going to prison for a very, very long time. Those that don't do both are being charged with murder, attempted kidnapping, conspiracy, and terrorism."

Sienna blinked. "Terrorism?"

"I'll say it again. Twenty-three dead faunus. Five injured faunus. That is, every faunus on the terrace or in the shops around it, was hurt or killed, _including_ the huntresses-in-training. The only human victim was sitting with faunus and actively attacked the ones who did this.

"Captain Nick Wolfe is lead investigator. He's hardly a White Fang apologist, but he is probably the closest thing to an active sympathizer the faunus have in the VCPD. Also, the FRU jumped all over this and reached for every lever they thought they could grab. Unlike the White Fang they still have ties to the Kingdoms' governments, including Vale's. So yes, hate crime charges, and since they can draw Grimm that's _de facto_ evidence of terrorism."

"It's not enough!"

Blake stepped back from the bed, her hand seeking the handle of the oxygen tank carrier. "When will it ever be, Sienna?"

* * *

Blake found Ruby and Weiss clustered next to Yang's bed.

"Heya, Pardner," Yang managed a slurred drawl. "Lookin' good."

"I could say the same about you," Blake replied.

"Oh I know I always look good," Yang agreed.

"How bad is it?"

Yang shrugged. "I'm on bed rest for the next week or so, but considering the alternative, you and the Doc do good work."

"You're lucky," Blake said.

"I blame you," Yang said.

"Me?" Blake asked suspiciously.

"Blake cats and all that… Face it, Blake. You're bad luck."

Blake's eyes narrowed. "Exactly how does that explain you?"

"Simple. If you hadn't shown up, I wouldn't've been shot in the first place," Yang grinned. "Think about it."

Despite herself, Blake found herself chuckling along with the others.

"So, you have to stay here another week?"

"No," Yang said. "They say I can camp out in our room, they just don't want me climbing up to my bed. I suppose I could curl up with you."

Blake started to reply and froze.

* * *

You open the door to Yang's recovery room. RWBY is standing around the bed, though Blake is still pulling the oxygen tank with her.

"Awkward," Ruby stage-whispers.

"Blake," you say, "still on oxygen?"

"The staff wants me on it for 24 hours," Blake replies. "It is, apparently, standard for exposure. No aura, and they want me to not exert myself."

"I see."

"Look, Professor," Yang starts, "we know we messed up but—"

"Messing up is making your battle plan a surprise night action against faunus without sufficient night-battle training, properly equipping your own forces for night combat, or achieving surprise," you reply. "Yang, you should be dead. If you'd taken an injury of similar severity while on patrol against Grimm, you _would_ be dead, and unless you were very, very fortunate, your _team_ would be just as dead. Do you know why?"

"Timing? I mean, we got lucky that Doctor Gray—"

"You worried about healing yourself with a hostile right in front of you instead of _raising your defenses_ ," you snarl at her. "If you'd bothered, that bullet would have skated right off your aura. And you poured far too much energy into clearing out the toxin. Blake, at least, took an intelligent, measured response…but then decided to pour much of her energy into you."

"But it worked," Weiss protests.

"After a fashion," you say. "I haven't gotten to the true imbecility yet. But I've told you, repeatedly, in class and in individual study that you need to be conscious of how you allocate yourselves, at least until you are experienced enough to do so reflexively. Yang saw fit to ignore that, or perhaps forgot about it, and as a result it's only because the Gods look out for idiots and little children that all of you are still alive.

"I'm seriously questioning whether I should have offered my class at all."

"If you hadn't we, and Dr. Gray, could never have healed her," Weiss says.

"If that…adventure had happened with simply unlocked auras, her aura would have protected her from the gunshot," you reply.

"If she hadn't activated her aura," Ruby began.

"By this point the process would have been reflexive, or it damn well should be," you point out in a dust-dry tone. "For that matter, it would have protected her from the toxin, at the very least it would have started clearing the toxin at a reasonable rate. Certainly, Yang could never have over-done the healing she did initially.

"Oh, and in the process, it would have made what you, JNPR, Fox, and Doctor Gray did unnecessary."

"So, the lessons you've taught meant that, in this instance, Yang was injured when she might otherwise not be," Weiss summarizes. "But they also gave us the tools to save her life."

"The fault is not with my lessons, save that, with one exception, I have been unwilling to actually injure any of you to get my point across. Perhaps if I had, Yang would have paid attention when I was telling you that you need to actively and accurately choose how to expend your energy."

"Uh…what one exception?"

"The Prof broke my nose to demonstrate that my first interface wasn't up to par," Yang admits.

"Why didn't you tell us that you were struggling?" Ruby demands.

"She wasn't," you say. "Her effort and progress were both acceptable. Her work was shoddy. There's a difference."

"I'll count today as a win," Blake says.

"I don't," you say flatly. "There are twenty-one dead civilians. We have no proof tying the criminals to any greater agency. Velvet's out of surgery, not that any of you asked."

"Will she be able to continue classes?" Ruby asks softly. She hasn't moved from her sister's side, but neither did she look away the rest of her team had.

"Too early to say," you reply. You run a hand through your hair, feeling the scar… "Probably," you offer. You don't know what Ozpin will do. Goodwitch will probably say she should be medically retired. But you've seen huntresses and huntsmen continue on after getting far worse, damn all what it did to their efficiency scores.

Time to change the subject.

"Have any of you spent any time considering what it might mean that Yang now has a part of your souls enmeshed in her own?"

That makes them stop and trade looks.

 _Hey, it's not that bad_ , I say.

'No, it's not,' you agree, then savagely add: 'it's worse!'

 _Oh c'mon. Are you telling me you wouldn't have done the same thing in their place?_

"Can you fix it?" Yang asks.

"Fix it?" you ask incredulously. "What, exactly, am I supposed to fix?"

"They, uh, the parts they left in me?"

"They're part of _you_ now," you reply. "I might as well cut off some of your fingers to pass around."

"There doesn't seem to be any lasting harm," Ruby offers.

"It's not been one day. Far from sufficient time to determine that," you reply. "How long have you thought about sharing a bed with Blake?"

"If it's a problem I could bunk with Weiss," Yang suggests.

"You most certainly will not!"

"Answer the question, please," you insist.

Yang shrugs.

"Normally we'd have talked about putting a mattress on the floor," Ruby says slowly.

"Have any of you considered that from her perspective you might as well have married Yang?"

" _What?_ " Yang and Ruby both blurt while Weiss and Blake look at you with varying degrees of dismay.

"You _did_ catch the part in class where I explained you'll be directly manipulating the energy produced by your souls, yes? Where, exactly, did you think that energy was coming from when you passed your… 'gifts' to Miss Xiao-Long?

"'Until death do you part' is likely to be an…extremely accurate description of today's events." You sigh. "I'll be honest. I've seen similar things before. However, none of those were performed under what might charitably be called emergency conditions."

 _What do you call us?_ I ask, you choose to ignore me.

"All of those incidents were deliberate, and balanced, involving an equal exchange between two people who knew each other extremely well. And none of them involved more than two people. Involving four people, and only one person receiving soul-shards from the other three… Any prediction I might make will be little more than a barely-informed guess."

"How bad could it be?" Yang asks.

"Your soul could destabilize, rip itself apart, and through your connection rip apart those of your teammates."

"Okay, yeah, that's…pretty bad," Yang admits.

"Give me a little time, I'll come up with something worse," you say darkly before shaking your head. "Anything you experience, anything you discover, let me know. The more data I have the better advice I can give you. For now… Just try to take it easy for a few days, and don't tinker. Let's let Yang's soul stabilize before we try any…experiments."

The muted assent was more than you'd expected.

"Okay, doom and gloom aside, you won and Sienna is still alive."

"That's a good thing?" Weiss asks.

"Jury's out," you reply. "Neither the White Fang disappear into factional chaos nor the potential rise of a unifying leader with a more extreme agenda is preferable, but we also do not know how she will react to today's events.

"We'll rehash the fight later and dissect the tactical mistakes. For now, I'm going to suggest you keep it to yourselves. VCPD has an investigation to run, and they're going to want to talk to all of you. You might be called to testify at any trials. If so, we'll be doing trial prep and you have the right to both legal counsel and have a professor present as well. Ruby, can we talk for a moment?"

The corridor is thankfully deserted when you close the door behind Ruby. "Doc Namon has zero experience working with teams like yours," you say. "When I told you at the beginning of class the technique was rare, I wasn't lying. You and your fellow students? You now comprise the majority, a _significant_ majority, of the people in the world who can use it."

"Oh," Ruby says slowly.

"I am de-certifying your team for combat until I'm certain Yang won't get you all killed. I'm not going to put that on file, though. If I did, I'd have to give a reason and that would almost certainly be a black mark on _Yang_ 's record for decisions and actions that are rightfully Blake's, Weiss', and yours."

Ruby flinches.

And…that's probably good enough, you decide. "All right," you sigh. "For what it's worth, Yang was stupid. That's pretty common to huntsmen and huntresses in training. She also survived which is somewhat less so. Your three teams pulled off a not-so-minor miracle to keep her alive. To say I'm not thrilled with _how_ your team in particular did so is a massive understatement. But...I can understand _why_ you did it. Part of that's on me. I didn't explain the dangers involved. I also didn't think you could soul-dive successfully and didn't want you to hurt yourselves trying. And you very much _would_ have hurt yourselves. Possibly beyond any hope of recovery. That said...that you pulled it off at all has impressed me. Greatly. Well done."

Ruby blinks at you, her mouth moving as she works her way through what you just said. "D-do you know _why_ we succeeded?"

You shrug. "Luck, skill, power, not knowing that something was impossible, the particulars of Yang's interface and her need to rebuild it left you in advance of her, my previous visit making follow-ons easier, the fact that she was dying... It could be a factor of your being half-sisters, or the fact that the four of you have been living in close proximity. Ruby, there are so many potential factors that it really isn't worth either of our time to quantify them all. There is enough trouble in our future without borrowing worries of the past."

"That's not it though," Ruby says. "Is it?"

You sigh. "No, Ruby it isn't. You want the truth? Fine. The truth is that I'm scared. You don't have the conceptual knowledge to understand the potential consequences for what you've done with Yang. I do. And it makes me _very_ concerned about your team's ability to function as future huntresses."

Ruby looks dejectedly at the ground. "When were you going to tell us?"

"When I had a better idea of whether or not my concerns were valid, possibly not until they had been proven one way or the other. Regardless, there's nothing you can do about it at this time. Go be with your team."

* * *

They had retreated, almost inevitably, to the lounge that had become 'theirs'.

Ruby had made the fastest-ever snack run in the history of Beacon, and half the academy was left smelling roses.

Weiss had picked out some film Yang had never heard of.

The action sequence had involved an attack by Vale submarines on an Atlas-bound convoy from Mistral during the Great War that had turned into a furious battle against oceanic Grimm. The convoy escorts were dead, and the submarines were keeping the ships alive, though it wasn't clear about where they were now headed. All in all, Yang judged, it would have been pretty good…if the battle hadn't been more than a transitional piece between bouts of people walking about on deck debating philosophy, war, and Grimm.

Blake and Ruby had both fallen asleep at some point, but Weiss was watching intently and eating cheese-coated popcorn apparently without regard for the orange cheese dust collecting on her fingers.

A scroll trilled, and Yang watched as Weiss first went rigid, then hurriedly wiped her hand on her combat skirt. She slipped from between Ruby and Blake, muting the movie as she answered her scroll.

"Father." Weiss' eyes flicked across Ruby and Blake who shifted closer to each other in her absence, then at Yang.

Yang watched her friend's eyes widen so she brought her fingers up to her mouth and mimed zipping it shut.

"I'm not alone," Weiss said, then, "not any time soon. Several of my classmates were injured this afternoon in the…incident. I've had to listen to medical staff repeatedly say that one of my teammates should not be alive, and another teammate was very nearly kidnapped."

She fell silent.

"I've been advised not to talk about it since it's an ongoing investigation by the VCP—Father, there were three teams from Beacon shopping in the Plaza or having lunch on the terrace. Of _course_ , we intervened when the shooting started."

Pause, her eyes drifting over to Blake's sleeping form before back to Yang, and Yang felt a moment of indecision.

"The White Fang?" Weiss asked. "I find that…unlikely."

The tension coming from Weiss was so thick Yang was tempted to hijack Crescent Rose's locker. If she was right, the wall opposite the door was on the exterior. It should be a simple matter to cut a hole and…defenestrate some of it.

"Since I've been here, the White Fang has done little more than disrupt FRU marches and otherwise make a nuisance of itself. Dust robberies are being blamed on a miscreant named Roman Torchwick."

She frowned suddenly and the person on the other end was loud enough that Yang could hear a high, tinny squeak.

"Actually yes, I do know that for a fact. Ruby broke up one robbery led by him, and from what I've seen on the news, subsequent robberies match what she reported. He had human goons in the attack Ruby thwarted, and in any case the White Fang would not work with a human."

Yang slowly pushed herself up, wincing as she did so, one hand coming up to rub at the bandage taped below her throat. She left Ruby and Blake and went to Weiss, hugging her from behind. For a moment Weiss' went rigid, and Yang loosened her arms enough to allow Weiss to pull away, but she didn't and, after a moment, leaned back against Yang.

"All of the…shooters were human." Then her head started to shake, slow at first, but quickly increasing. "I wouldn't know about the faunus casualties _or_ what the captured…persons are saying. I'm not involved with the investigation at all…" she paused, "I can try suggesting that, but I doubt they'll want a team involved in the incident to be involved in the investigation."

She said nothing for a long moment. "Might I suggest we talk further when I am alone?" Then, "Good day, Father."

Weiss disconnected the line and then her arms fell as though each were holding a two hundred-pound kettlebell, her scroll dangling from her fingertips. "I hate that man," she said softly.

"He terrifies you," Yang said, lifting Weiss.

"Put me _down_ you brute!"

Yang managed three strides, then twisted sideways as she collapsed heavily onto a loveseat with Weiss in her lap.

"What were you thinking?" Weiss hissed, conscious of her sleeping partner and teammate. "Damnit, Yang, you are supposed to be taking it easy!"

"Don't change the subject. He terrifies you."

Weiss glowered at Yang. "Fine. Yes, He terrifies me. And if you stress yourself again I will use a bind-glyph to make you stay in bed for the entire _week_."

"Kinky," Yang said, but it lacked both her usual energy and the not-quite-smile/not-quite-leer the threat normally would have elicited. "You think he sent those people this afternoon?"

"Almost certainly," Weiss said. "Neither VCPD, nor any military, would so cold-bloodedly execute civilians, potential security or no. Not in a daylight raid with witnesses."

"How do you think he knew?" Yang asked.

Weiss looked at her.

"He needed time to get his people in place and stuff. I can't really see any of the others at Beacon tipping him off."

"I don't know," Weiss said. "Not worried that I—"

"Nope," Yang said, giving the 'p' even more pop than her partner usually did. "Y'know. It's okay to let yourself like this."

"Like what?"

"Being hugged. Body contact. Cuddling. Whatever."

Weiss' eyes flew wide, and she started to push herself up, but Yang's arms were like iron.

"I get the feeling you didn't get hugs all that often."

"Are you inside my _mind_?" Weiss spat.

Yang fell silent. "Maybe a little," she conceded. "Or maybe you're inside me?" she asked with a playful leer that caused Weiss' frigid glare to turn full-Atlas-in-winter. "I mean, I'm not getting actual thoughts, words, pictures, whatever… Just…I could feel the tension, how much you didn't like talking to your father. But I've known for a while now that you like Ruby's hugs a lot more than you pretend you do. And it's pretty obvious that you enjoy snuggling together when watching movies."

"I do not!" Weiss protested.

"Uh huh, sure. Why do you squeeze in between Blake and Ruby then?"

"There is no suitable furniture for the entire team other than the beanbag chair."

"And who, exactly, got that for us?" Yang said.

"Are you sure it's not school equipment?" Weiss said quickly.

"I'm sure no other lounge has one identical to it…and that the company that does it only does custom-orders. Sorry, Weiss. Money speaks louder than words."

Weiss sighed and leaned back against Yang. "Admittedly, this is…nice. And if you tell anyone I said that I'll…"

"You'll what? Kill me?"

"Of course not," Weiss sighed. "I'll do something asinine and childish like using water Dust to make the inside of your sleeping bag damp or some such."

The door to your quarters closes, and there is a deep click as the locks engage. You cross the room to the tiny kitchenette.

Tongs go on a small braiser that you load with burn Dust. You draw a glass of water chilled with several ice cubes into which you dip a white feather. A bottle comes from the wine cooler you'd installed under the counter. The tongs are applied to the neck of the bottle, then the feather.

 _You know that's unnecessary for that bottle_ , I note as you snap the neck off the bottle.

"Shh," you murmur. "The ritual rationalizes itself. Besides, when did you learn about wine?"

 _Who lives in a computer now...snob?_

You don't reply as you settle down on your couch and sip your beverage.

"Hot damn," you say at last.

 _And here I thought you were pissed_.

"Oh, I am so far beyond pissed that even you would have trouble quantifying it," you chortle.

 _And also happy, it would seem_.

"Twelve kids, most of them with less than four months of serious training, shut down a SDC strike team. Darn right I'm pleased."

 _Raven didn't intervene this time_.

"Didn't have time or wasn't watching?"

 _The area was public, or maybe she assumed the wound was mortal and is planning to hit Jacques in retaliation._

"We could be so lucky."

There is a knock on your door.

"Enter!"

It's your quarters rather than your office, but all of your students know how to reach you just in case. But it isn't Ruby, or any of the others who walk through your door, but Ozpin.

"Good evening," he says.

"Is it?"

That gets a smile, but a small one. "Regardless, might I trouble you for a moment of your time?"

"I suppose. Wine?" you ask. You've got cocoa stashed away from the chocolate-swilling bastard, but it's really too sweet to fit the mood this evening.

"I will not say no," he allows.

You get up and fetch him a glass.

"We almost lost a student."

"We almost lost five," you correct.

That gets his attention. "From how far in the future are you, Blake?"

You close your eyes. "Don't call me that," you say after a moment. "She isn't me. They aren't my friends. _My_ team, my _friends_ , are dead and buried. Those of them that there was anything left to have funerals for."

I activate the smart-wall and peer out with my Amy Chiaroscuro avatar. "Hey! What am I, chopped liver?"

Ozpin raises an eyebrow at me, but you don't respond.

"Very well, Vala," he says after a long moment.

"Good," you grunt in reply. "How long have you been waiting to ask me that?"

"Since the day we met. Dare I ask how it worked out last time?"

"It didn't. This was new."

Ozpin looks up at from examining his wine. "You consider that a good thing?"

You give that the consideration it deserves rather than reply immediately. "I do, actually."

"More than twenty people died."

"And that is regrettable," you acknowledge. "But civilians always die."

Ozpin doesn't speak for a time, but when he does, "I wouldn't want to ever be so callous to the deaths of others."

"That's fair enough," you concede, though saying you're callous, or even indifferent, to those deaths is hardly true. It's also not far enough from the truth that you feel a desire, much less a need, to quibble. "I wouldn't want to go through millennia caring that deeply. The tragedy of it would break me far more thoroughly than anything our enemies have done or might do."

Frankly, you're more bothered by the fact that you are…less responsive to those tragedies than you are to the deaths themselves.

You press on quickly rather than allow yourself to linger on the point. "They are temporarily more vulnerable than a simple unlocked aura would allow, true. But they are also progressing at a far more rapid pace than I might have hoped for and they've demonstrated a facility for using their training in new ways, adapting it to the situation."

"You are talking about Team RWBY."

"I'm talking about Fox. I've never seen one person take another with no training, and then integrate two semblances the way they did. I'm less than thrilled about Team RWBY. Coming up with that course of action was impressive, yes. But they didn't actually succeed in what they wanted to do. What they _did_ do managed to save Yang's life, but it will have lasting consequences. Only the Gods know where those will end.

"Unless you happen to have the Relic of Knowledge at hand?"

Ozpin frowns. "You know about the Relics, then."

"About you, the Maidens, Salem? Of course, I do. I also know about STRQ, about your little gift to the Branwen twins, where the Spring Maiden is, and—"

"Where?"

"Not telling. For one, she's reasonably safe. Even more importantly, she's anonymous. Salem doesn't know where she is, and not telling you will ensure you don't accidentally lead one of her minions to…her. And if you stopped looking it might do that anyway."

"I don't care for your conclusions." Ozpin sips at his wine. "But your logic is sound enough."

"Do you know where the consequences for Team RWBY will end?"

"No," Ozpin said. "What you are teaching is a vanishingly rare skill set. Even in the past."

"Did you—"

"No." He smiles slightly then. "I never found someone who trusted me enough, or that I trusted in turn, to teach me. The times I tried to learn on my own were…less than successful."

"I bet," you snort softly.

"You dislike me," he sighs. "I'm sure that I must have earned it."

"I don't dislike you," you object, "I don't even hate you. Despise? Yes, I _despise_ you. We, the Professors, take our cues from you, our students from us, _society_ from them, and all of that says discrimination against the faunus is okay. You placed—will place—the hope of the world on my friend's shoulders and I watched it crush her. You move people around your little chessboard, giving them just the information they need to make the 'choice' you _want_ them to make… Do you really care about your students at all, or are they just more tools in your little feud with Salem?"

Ozpin sips his wine. "You've been waiting to say that for a while."

"It doesn't _begin_ to touch the list of things I've wanted to say to you," you say spitefully.

"I've told you, if a student comes to you—"

"They haven't and they won't," you say shortly. "You've convinced them that even if they do nothing will change. That if, as a huntsman, you won't intervene in an obvious injustice that happens in front of your nose, you won't intervene if someone comes and reports one to you. Opinion is divided between Winchester and his ilk having your tacit support, your unwillingness to take heat from the Council if you decide to punish or expel him, or if you just flat out don't care."

You watch Ozpin flinch and stare at his wine.

You take a breath, let it out, and move on. "On the upside, I've confirmed Jaune Arc's semblance."

"You already knew what it was. So did I for that matter."

"True," I said. "But last time it took more than a year for him to unlock it."

"Why wou—" Ozpin stops suddenly. "He has the _major_ Arc semblance?" he asks carefully.

"Yes." You sip your own wine. "There are other advantages to consider. Accelerating Weiss' break from her father, for one."

"You believe that to be a good thing?"

"Good question." And not one you have an easy answer to. "Weiss' family situation is nearly as complicated as the Xiao Long/Rose sisters' and only slightly less-so than the Belladonna family. The difference is, Yang's parents have radically different opinions on what is 'best' for her, while Weiss Schnee's father is incredibly self-centered and corrosive to those around him.

"Taiyang, Qrow, and Raven, each want the sisters to have as little to do with your private little war as possible. Each for their own, admittedly completely understandable and not unreasonable, reasons. But none of them are likely to use Yang or Ruby as leverage to further their own agenda. Jacques, on the other hand, will use Weiss that way without a second thought.

"In any other situation, I'd say she would be well to be rid of him. Unfortunately, she is not an only child and her mother is still alive, and there is the matter of the SDC as well. The company, or rather the legacy of her grandfather represented by it, likely means more to her than even she might believe. There is also the—"

"Why are you doing this?" Ozpin interrupts. "You implied that you didn't need them to deal with…this other threat."

"I don't." You drain your glass. "Salem is your threat. I want my fri— I want _them_ to survive it, and that means they need to be able to kick ass harder, further, and for longer than we were able to. But also, if I'm wrong, I'm going to need allies. Allies that are stronger than they were when it went down last time."

"I could insure you have them."

"No, you can't. You couldn't last time. You couldn't even deal with the enemy you had. If the timing remains anywhere close, or you take too many casualties among your allies…"

Ozpin grimaces. "I can't help if I don't have information."

You start to refuse him again.

"He has a point, you know."

You turn to glare at the smart screen, at _me_. "You want to tell him? I thought you agreed with me."

"Changing things so we miss our shot is out. But Ozpin is still one of the wisest people we know. For that matter, simply having another person to bounce ideas off of… Besides, if we go down, then someone needs to know."

"That's…a good point, actually." You turn back to Ozpin. "Okay."

Ozpin's eyebrows go up. "I didn't actually expect you to agree," he murmurs.

"I don't," you reply. "I thought it a bad idea. I still think it is, for that matter. But if I get killed it leaves everyone just as vulnerable. So I'll give you background. Some idea of the scope of the threat and how it came about, and what my plan is. But you can't move on it, because if I miss my chance, this might all be over. And if you get too distracted from Salem that you miss something important, she'll make us just as dead."

"Agreed."

"Were you ever briefed on Project Nutcracker?"

"Should I have?"

"Probably. Okay, how much do you know about AI?"

"More than most, but I am hardly an expert."

Which is probably the truth.

You gesture to me.

"Good morning…Ozpin," I intone mechanically, peeling back 'Amy Chiaroscuro' for my Ametrine avatar.

"Ozpin, meet Ametrine. She's a fifth-generation AI."

"Ametrine," Ozpin raises an eyebrow slightly. "I believe _black_ was your color, Blake, but nightshade is purple…and gold? Hello, Yang."

"Oh poo. You recognize me," I pout as I put my old body, the one that still had its full complement of fingers and toes, on and waved a hand at him. "And this with no lead in. I was sure that after _Blakey_ —"

"Vala," you insist.

"—forbade me from making crank calls that I'd get at least one good pass in before you pegged to who I was."

You roll your eyes. "The first-gens are glorified expert-systems. Within their area of expertise, they perform well and can fool an unaware person into thinking they're human. Or faunus, but most of them are programmed for human appearance. You try to take them outside their programming and they shut down."

Ozpin nods slightly.

"The second-generation are more versatile, but they're also unstable. They don't last long. Most either got lost within their own little worlds or they become fixated on something. Whether or not they are 'real' people is a popular debate."

"Third-gen," I cut in, "is where Project Nutcracker comes in. Actually, it's a transitional design and really should be—"

"Amy," you say.

"Oh fine," I huff. "Project Nutcracker is Atlas' attempt to make a synthetic equivalent of a huntsman paralleling their development of synthetic soldiers."

"The Synth-Hunter Project?" Ozpin asks

"Yesss," you hiss, giving him a wary look.

There are many who would say that Ozpin feels very little. Certainly, his cocoa-swilling, cookie-providing habits and the slight smirk of perpetual amusement that most see would support the idea of a man who is not coldly indifferent, nor firmly controlled, but rather a degree of…insulation.

Frankly, you can understand the need for insulation. After six thousand years you're half-surprised that his emotions haven't been seared away by repeat heartache and the passage of time.

It takes a lot of break through that façade, and only those he ever feels particularly close to get to see what is under it. You aren't the latter, not yet, not with this Ozpin, but his ever-present look of bemusement has settled into something…grimmer.

"The Synthetic Huntsman Project was shut down," Ozpin said. "It never went beyond a concept phase."

"Yeah, about that," you say. "Turns out Ironwood took it on himself to develop the needed technology. Just in case, you understand. He wasn't prepared to put it together, not even into a prototype, but he wanted to get as much development done as possible so that if an emergency came along they could field something as soon as possible."

"I'm not going to like where this goes."

"Since you knew when you hired me that the world got fucked, what made you think that wouldn't be the case?" you ask bluntly. "More wine?"

"It seems like the night for it."

"Good thing for you. Well, middling good, I suppose. It meant he had the tech to save the Fall Maiden when Salem's proxy bushwacked her."

"You know about that too, then?"

"We know how it went down and that she ended up somewhere in the basement," I say.

"As near as we can figure, it wasn't Ironwood at all," you add as you get up. "One of his lead project leaders, a man by the name of Polendina, was in charge of aura integration. His daughter, Penelope, was a student at Atlas, was nearly killed in a training accident. We never got the full details, but she lived long enough for Polendina to slap a chassis together and create an 'aura transfer rig.' A couple of minutes later and you have so much meat on one slab and the world's first autonomous cybernetic entity capable of producing an aura on the other."

"How much of Penelope survived the transfer?"

"We don't know," I said. "We only ever met Penny and that briefly. Penny was…very odd. Even by the measure of most huntresses-in-training. Very literal. Very…mechanical in her combat operations. Heavy-tank, limited mobility shown, but she had enough firepower packed in that she didn't really have a demonstrated need for mobility."

"She was self-aware as an artificial person, anyway," I offer. "We didn't find out about Penelope until years later. It wouldn't surprise me if Penny _wasn't_ aware of the origins of her ability to manifest an aura."

"There are some pretty drastic cosmetic changes between Penelope and Penny," you continue. "They'd developed a synthetic skin, but they hadn't really looked at underlying structure and…other cosmetic features."

"I'm not sure I understand what you're implying," Ozpin says.

"They didn't exactly have a chassis waiting around," I explain. "But Atlas loves it's high-tech toys. They used a pre-existing model and then updated it with the tech they _had_ developed."

"The external chassis came from a sexbot," you say bluntly. "They refitted it with armor, and the various offensive and defensive systems they'd developed, and layered in this really neat sensory web over it, and then a biosynthetic skin over that."

Ozpin falters, "And she—"

"Appeared to be about sixteen. Maybe. Humans are perverse."

"Says the cat-girl who left her smut laying around a room with an impressionable _fifteen_ -year-old with a weapon fetish."

You ignore me.

"You said she was in the Vytal Tournament?" he asks. "How did she do?"

"She made it to the singles round, but was in an accident and died, or was damaged beyond recovery if you prefer, before the final match," you reply. Her death was an accident on Pyrrha's part, so what you just said had at least a thread of truth. Since someone else engineered it you wouldn't count on there being two threads. "When she does, her remains will be taken back to Polendina's lab. I will be in a position to trace them…and destroy the lab, its equipment, and terminate all of the project employees."

"That seems a bit extreme," Ozpin says.

"To you. Right now."

You sigh tiredly. "Penny isn't a threat, Ozpin. She's a means to an end. When things get really desperate in a few years, Atlas will start cranking out a mass-produced version. The Academies put out a couple hundred new Hunters a year, of which maybe a few dozen are still active five years after graduation. Atlas' factories can put out a thousand of those bastards a month. And it isn't just one thing Atlas got wrong. It was two. The first was believing they were in control. The second was how they tried to get it back when they lost it."

"Tell me."

You look at Ozpin, then at your nearly empty glass and sigh. "I am nowhere near sober enough for this story."

"Things got very, very bad, Ozpin," I say from the television set. "The production units were considered type 4 AIs. They didn't have the cringeworthy soul-swapping of the Type 3s, but the fact they didn't have a human or faunus porting over their consciousness meant that the stability issues of the Type 2s had to be addressed some other way."

"They were…are…will be…" you give up on the proper tense and struggle for a moment to try and explain what the synths are like before giving up on that as well. "They're strange, Ozpin."

"They don't intuit," I provide, "and their problem-solving tends to be very linear, but they can sim so far ahead and so fast that their actions _seem_ to be incredibly imaginative if…bizarre. They are…real too. They have feelings, a sense of humor that's so dry it's difficult to tell when they are being serious or making a joke.

"It finally got bad enough that Ironwood started cranking them out," you take over again. "As a test to demonstrate their reliability, Ironwood had—" past tense it is, or maybe it should called post-future tense? "—the bright idea of using them to take down the White Fang which, admittedly, had grown into a not inconsequential threat. He provided a series of identified safe-houses, weapon caches, and training camps, and let them go to work. Their first orders boiled down to two things. Protect the people of Atlas. And neutralize the White Fang wherever they might be found.

"They extrapolated, determined that a couple of safehouses and such wouldn't 'neutralize' the White Fang, which would leave the people of Atlas unprotected against future attacks. Likewise waiting for them to attack would also breach the 'protect the people of Atlas' directive."

"I take it they didn't ask for further clarification of their orders?" Ozpin asks, sipping his wine.

"They systematically slaughtered a third of the faunus population of Atlas."

You watch Ozpin choke as he inhales his wine instead of drinking it. For a moment it seems likely that there would be a new version of Ozpin running around the world in the near future. But he eventually manages to recover and looks at you with an expression of…horror? Grief?

Horror, you decide.

"You're joking," he says faintly.

"That's the thing about guerilla warfare," you say, a small smile lacking anything that a blind man on the other side of the world who had never met you might have charitably described as possibly humor cracking your face. "Fighters blend into the civilian population because unless they are out fighting, they are _part_ of that population. As such, the Synths considered that any faunus might be a member, future member, sympathizer, or part of the support netowrk of the White Fang," you said.

"The Synths categorized known faunus with unlocked auras as high-priority threats. Guess which single institution had the highest population _and_ density of faunus with unlocked auras in the whole of Atlas?"

Ozpin closes his eyes. "Atlas Academy."

"It was destroyed, along with all the trainees and professors who rose up in defense of their colleagues and classmates. The same thing was repeated, albeit on a lesser scale, for the active huntsmen teams. That's before they start going after civilians, mind you. And then in the aftermath Jacques Schnee comes out and publicly blames the _faunus_ for the devastation since all that it would have taken to avert it would have been for them to surrender…

"But between the surviving huntresses and the White Fang's action arm—which was a lot better armed and trained than anyone thought—fighting a delaying action, the White Fang's support structure was able to evacuate a sizeable number of Atlas's civilian faunus population.

"But it was huge purely in total numbers. As a fraction of Atlas' faunus population it was pathetic."

"And the rest?" Ozpin asked hollowly.

"The project team hacked their creations and shut them down…eventually. Fighting them conventionally is a losing proposition, even for huntsmen and huntresses. Rather than admit the mistake, Atlas, Ironwood, and the project team blamed it on the Synths being hacked."

"Hacked?"

"Hostile electronic intrusion. Cybernetic security is a critical failing that Salem capitalizes on. I've started a program to change that around, but frankly there's a limit to how much can get done in the time I had available."

"If you—"

"I agreed to brief you on the Synths," you reply.

"There's more?"

"Oh my, yes," you say. "The team at Project Nutcracker produced another variant, the mod II. They were a bit less rigid in their thinking, and were better at interacting with flesh-and-bloods. But they were designed so that you had to physically open one up to input code. And they were limited to basic sensors without the internal coms or integrated cybernetic battlenetwork of the Mod Is. It made them unhackable and should have made them easier to take down since they didn't have the extensive command and control coordinating their actions. But they've got integrated weapons even more extreme than the base model, a more efficient power plant, they are stronger, faster, and they can 'talk' to each other in hyper-compressed microburst that isn't audible to human and faunus, doesn't peg current sensors, and if it isn't as good as the Mod Is' free-flow battlenet, it's more than good enough.

"The 'unhackable' part also meant Atlas had no way of stopping them when they went rogue."

"They didn't include a failsafe of any kind?" Ozpin asked.

"No, they did. The Synths figured out how to disable it. They toed the party line and didn't actually revolt until well after they'd done that. The first ones weren't really active long enough to start asking philosophical questions. The second wave, were. It comes down to aura, you see. Aura is the manifestation of the soul. Possessing a soul—"

"Implies the existence, and exercise, of free will."

"Yeah. And that's something I don't think Ironwood ever really got. They were just tools to him. Like his normal robots. And when they let him know that they were having a slave rebellion—they actually commed him to tell him that—he threatened to destroy the production facilities. Threatening to destroy a peoples' ability to reproduce is a threat to their existence. At that point any semblance of restraint went right out the window. Humanity and faunus alike had become a threat to their very existence.

"We fought. They fought. By that point Salem was sitting back laughing her ass off. It ended a couple years later with me trying to defuse a bomb named 'Final Answer' loaded with more gravity Dust than I've ever seen in one place."

You can see the frustration in his eyes as you gloss over the last few years, but you can't do it. Even with a second bottle of wine you can't get out the whole sad story. Watching your friends die. Watching the Kingdoms die. The wretched state of the few survivors left scrambling in the dirt for a few fragments of broken cities that might make the difference between hardscrabble life and prolonged death.

That's okay, I can't tell him either. I _do_ tell him about breaking the back of their last attack though, and about you staring into your own reflection as you tried and failed to disarm their 'Final Answer.' About experiencing our world being torn apart…

…only to wake up in the Blight.

"I know the development team, all the equipment and data, the prototypes, are located at just one site," you say sometime later. "Atlas is, quite understandably, keeping this one very, very close."

"You don't know where the site is," Ozpin surmises.

"Correct. Penny's death, when they retrieve her parts I can follow them back to it. So far despite the changes that is on track. If I miss it, then I miss my best chance at ending this threat before it has a chance to exist."

"And you believe going to Ironwood will only cause him to bury it deeper."

"What do you think?"

"I think without a convincing explanation for how I know, you might well be correct. However, if you can expose the project to me, there are steps I can take. James, at least, will jump at a chance to prove himself in the right."

"You think you can wrangle an inspection tour out of him?" That'd be really convenient.

"Perhaps. There are a couple of other possibilities." Ozpin consults the dregs of his wine.

"I'm going to kill them all, Ozpin. Everyone connected to it."

"Not James."

"Ironwood is useful to you. I get that. But this project cannot be allowed to exist. We got lucky last time that Salem didn't find out about it earlier. We were unreasonably lucky that Cinder didn't stop to consider the implications, or pass on the program when she first discovered it."

"I agree with you about the program. Just…hold off on James. Please."

You nod grudgingly. "I suppose I can give you a little time." And you will, because, dammit, Ironwood _was_ useful against Salem. She might not be your priority anymore, but she still exists and her goals where people you consider friends are concerned hasn't changed.

"The Fall Maiden…"

"I know who the next one is," you reply. "Or, I suppose, 'could be' might be the better answer."

"And?" he presses.

"It doesn't work out the way anyone expects…to our benefit, in the long run."

And like always, Ozpin has a knack for zeroing in on the key words, not that you put any effort into hiding them this time. "I take it that the...transfer is detrimental to us in the short run, then?"

"Oh, you could say that," you agree. "You'd even not be wrong."

"Then you are aware of the current status of the Fall Maiden?"

"Only in general terms. I know of the attack, but by the time I had a chance to ask questions about its aftermath the matter was well in the past and we had more pressing concerns."

You manage to keep your expression detached at Ozpin outlines the attack on the current Fall Maiden, the technology Ironwood has provided, and the plan to transfer her aura.

"We could accelerate the transfer, or refine the candidate."

"No!" you say, standing, as pieces begin to slid together, "you can't."

"I can't?" he asks, and there is a very dangerous edge to his voice.

"Damn." It's little more than a whisper, but Ozpin's eyebrow jumps. "Damn," you say again, "that does make sense. The timing. I always thought…" you shake your head.

Ozpin sits back as you inspect both empty bottles of wine, and then consider going back for a third.

"Damn," you mutter.

"You have said it thrice, and what you say three times is true," I offer.

You make a rude gesture that Ozpin pretends not to notice.

"You convince, well, your candidate to go ahead so the matter becomes moot," you say, gesturing with an empty bottle. "But I'll bet that Ironwood has a fallback option. Hell, I'll bet that's why he got behind the project and pushed when he found out about it instead of ending things right there. A person that he could literally _make_ into a Maiden."

"You are concerned that if we accelerate the process, Ironwood might not leave this special project exposed."

"Yes."

"But if we don't, the consequences for the world, Vale, and Beacon are likely to be…severe."

"Also, yes," you agree. "But by now Salem's plans are close to maturity, including contingency options. I know enough that I could derail her primary plans fairly easily."

"Then why haven't you?"

"Because she's subtle. She wants to crush sapient life. To do that in the last time line, she started an avalanche. First one stone got a nudge, then another, a third, and so on. But if I stop her first stone, to continue the analogy, she could still drop a boulder. There are lots and lots of ways of doing that. Crash a crowded Amity Colosseum into an area densely populated by faunus, for one. Then you have not only a world catastrophe, but a species-centric one as well. I know so little about her initial contingency plans that whatever is picked will probably succeed and the consequences for Vale will be worse, and it won't actually stop her."

Ozpin's scowl is…terrifying, but then he sighs and just looks very, very tired.

"What?"

He looks at you with a small smile. "When we first met I had allowed myself to hope…"

"A dangerous thing, hope," you agree. "Useful in small quantities, but poison in large enough doses."

"I don't suppose you have any other options?" Ozpin asks.

"Sure. We could hire every huntsman and huntress in the world. I could kill the Fall Maiden-to-be at the same time you pull the plug on the current, then I go and rally Spring at the same time you haul out the others from where you're hiding them, we grab the Relics, rustle up Ironwood's fleet, and launch an all-out bid for victory."

Ozpin gives you a look as though he's actively considering the merits of your proposal. "Do you think that would work?" he asks at last.

"Has it worked for you in the past where you relied on brute strength?"

"No."

"Well…there you go."

"Tell me…Vala," he says after a time. "Just what do you believe in?"

"Ruby Rose," you say without hesitating.

He merely looks at you.

"If Salem and you don't destroy her like you did last time, you can always believe in Ruby Rose. She believes. This whole…legend you've created about huntsmen and huntresses. She believes in it. Believes in it _hard_. It doesn't matter how many times you beat her down, how many of her friends you kill, it may take her time to recover from the…heartache, but she'll still believe, she won't ever quit, and she always seems to know the right thing to do or say.

"And there's something about her that makes you go on. No matter what. No matter how hard. She doesn't have to drag you, you do it willingly, even gladly, well past the point you'd quit on your own. It's a lot like the weaker Arc Semblance, but it isn't. It's just who she is.

"That's why the only times Team RWBY has ever been bested was when they were apart. And it's why when you ask me what I believe in…I believe in her."

Ozpin smiles at that. "Thank you."

"For what?"

"For hope," he said. "Not a great hope, just _a_ hope, enough hope to see it through."

"Yeah. I can get behind that," you agree. "Now get out."

Ozpin nods slowly. "I imagine we'll talk again."

"You do that. I'll continue looking for an excuse to have Winchester expelled."

Ozpin winces again. "Until then," he nods once, and leaves.

"Expelled…or killed," you tell the door.

"That went well, I think," I say, watching you glare at the door.

You raise your glass. "A toast. To cripples, bastards, and broken things…and Weiss Schnee, of course."

"Which one are you?" I ask.

You run a hand back through your cobalt-dyed hair, splitting it to reveal a scar where once there had been an ear.

* * *

A/n: And so we close out part one. As I said at the beginning, I started this to play around with tenses (post-future-tense, woo!) and it sort of grew from there. There's a six-part interlude that more or less brings things to approximate end of volume 1 of RWBY that I plan to post. After that we'll have to see.

Thank you for reading, and your support.


	20. Volume 15, Chapter 1: Aftermath

**Disclaimer:** Still doesn't own RWBY, _does_ still have computer issues, but everyone has been patient so I'll go ahead and post

* * *

Classroom  
Beacon Academy  
Vale

"…and extracted by bullhead," you finish your recitation of the sequence of events at Northridge Plaza and look around the classroom at the two first year, and one second year, teams. "Coco, you're the senior team-leader. Why don't you start?"

"My position gave me no ability to control the situation," Coco said. "That said, Jaune did about as good a job as could be asked for considering what went down. SDC goons—retired SDC goons," she interjects before Weiss can, "—trying to kidnap Khan and Belladonna was never a contingency we considered."

"I became too involved in my cover," Velvet added. "I'd stopped paying attention to my surroundings. At the very least I should have had my aura up but…it's tiring. More so than I remembered it being when I first got it unlocked."

You nod. "Good point. It's not the first time one of you has commented on it, and most are having issues with instinctively protecting yourself—we'll get to _your_ actions later, Xiao-Long. Did any of you consider the possible ramifications if it _was_ an ambush aimed at Blake?"

Uneasy looks are traded and you nod again. "About what I expected. Moving on, Yatsuhashi?"

"I need to spend further time considering how to make use of improvised weapons," the giant of a second-year says. "Two faunus were killed in part because of the delay in my engaging them. Or, barring that, perhaps a secondary weapon, one more concealable, or perhaps I should say more appropriate in public settings, than Masamune. Coco has instructed me to take additional firearm familiarization courses."

"I suppose that's one option," you allow.

He shook his head. "I do not wish to use such weapons generally, but I took several from the foes I defeated. I should have made good use of them and I did not; owing to insufficiency of skill."

"Fox?"

"I'm in the same boat as Yatsu," Fox said. "My weapons aren't exactly easy to hide, even in plain sight. My disguise worked well enough, but it was the kind of disguise that works well for observation. Intervening…I need to be able to intervene effectively."

"Talk with Yatsuhashi. Both of you have three options. Yatsuhashi identified one. Can anyone pick out the others?"

"Oooh, me," Ruby says.

You roll your eyes. "Ruby."

"Modify your weapons, adding functionality to make them more concealable and, in Yatsuhashi's case, handy in a close fight; or acquiring new _primary_ weapons that are specialized for such a fight and can be stored in between."

You hum softly. "It can be a pain to sort between specialized and more generic gear. There's always the risk of being caught with the wrong equipment, or more often having a new contract come up with no time to change out. But having the essential tools for a job is vital. The difference in capability will be not just a matter of success or failure, but life or death. Under those circumstances specialization must be of a secondary concern. At best."

You wait long enough to make sure they've all caught the critical points, and move on. "Whose idea was it to break up partners?"

"Uh…Mine," Jaune admits.

"Why?"

"I thought having two sniper teams on overwatch made sense," Jaune says. "Ren has some spotting experience, Nora and Weiss don't."

"And yourself?"

"Not really, but the only one who did is Yang, and she insisted on covering Blake. It made sense. Pyrrha's the only other person who is fast enough and good enough close-in to credibly assist Blake if it was necessary. She's too well-known. She's been mobbed by civilians before. On top of that, her presence would have been making a statement to the White Fang. If Khan's presence were known, it'd be a statement to all of her fans as well. With Yang, if it all went off well Khan would have left thinking Yang was Blake's only backup. Besides, Pyrrha had our only other precision long-range weapon."

"Did you think all that out?" you ask.

"We all did," Pyrrha replies. "Jaune pointed out that I had the only other suitable weapon, Blake the White Fang's reaction to my presence, Weiss the public's reaction."

"Well, it's nice to know you thought it out, at least."

"I didn't really need a spotter," Ruby says. "I mean, it would have been nice, but I…dealt. And sticking with me gave Jaune the ability to see everything and coordinate."

"Not the point I was making, though your observation about distancing him to enable coordination is well-made. The problem with it is that Weiss and Nora were delayed by the civilians who wanted to talk to 'Weiss Schnee' and—" you gesture to the holographic reconstruction that had just played out, "Pyrrha, care to explain your shooting?"

Pyrrha hangs her head dejectedly. "I'm sorry," she says.

"I didn't ask for an apology. I asked for an explanation."

"I don't… I haven't… I'm sorry?"

"Distance or the angle?" Ruby asks.

"Both?" Pyrrha replies helplessly. "I mean, snap-shots in a fight is one thing but—"

"You haven't had much need to shoot at something that wasn't right in your face," you finish. "Hmm… I want you to qualify for at least two of the shooting competitions in the Vytal tournament. At least one must have a substantial range or elevation component."

"Yes, Professor," Pyrrha says woodenly.

The side tournaments were nowhere near as heavily advertised or followed as the general combat tournament. The participation of Pyrrha Nikos was almost certain to draw additional attention. If she lost, would it finally prick the inflated hyperbole of the 'Invincible Girl?' Probably. How would her sponsors and public react?

Hmmm….

"Ruby. Tutor her. Her success, or failure, will be reflected in _your_ grades."

Ruby gulps.

"Coco, take Weiss and Pyrrha and teach them how to be surreptitious. You managed to avoid hordes of civilians."

"You aren't giving me much to work with."

"Your point?" you ask bluntly.

Coco shrugs slightly.

"Weiss, Nora, good job once you finally did get into things. Xiao-Long—"

"Not another lecture, Professor. Please?"

You almost smile at her. But only almost. "You almost got yourself killed. Again."

"Again?" she protests. "Name one other time that I—"

"Initiation. You had the bright idea to jump into the mouth of a giant nevermore."

"I—"

"Ursa chew-toy," Ruby adds.

"But—"

"When did _that_ happen?" Jaune asks.

"Just before I stopped Torchwick. She wanted to practice my hand-to-hand and insisted I leave Crescent Rose inside."

"Ruby," you say, pulling things back onto track. "Adequate shooting over all.

"Moving on…"

* * *

Office of the Headmaster, Commanding General, and Councilman James Ironwood  
Atlas Academy  
Atlas

"Specialist Schnee, reporting as ordered, Sir."

"Winter!" James Ironwood said, turning from a smartwall configured into a dozen displays across which information crawled. His voice was warm, almost friendly, and he gestured towards a small sitting area comprised of two chairs (one obviously reinforced), a small couch, and a low table between them. "Sit."

"Sir?"

"Sit," he repeated. He ran two mugs under a dispenser before crossing to the same nook. He extended one of the mugs to Winter and waited for him to take it before sitting down in his chair.

"General?" Winter tried again.

"There's been an incident in Vale," Ironwood said. "Your sister is unharmed, but three of her classmates, two of them members of her team, are not, and over twenty civilians are dead. With the exception of one of her teammates, all of them are faunus."

"I see," Winter said tightly. "White Fang false-flag operation? We know they've been disrupting peaceful protests in Vale even if—"

"No," Ironwood said. "And given those involved I gave the it serious consideration before dismissing it."

"Then what's the problem?"

"The perpetrators are all human."

"Mercenaries? They've used humans as catspaws, cutouts, and to do other dirty work before."

"Perhaps." Ironwood consulted his mug briefly. "The perpetrators were taken alive, Winter. They are former employees of the Schnee Dust Company. Former, I say, because Jaques has splendidly official records that conclusively 'prove' that their employment with the SDC was terminated almost a month ago."

Winter's lips tightened and what little color she had bleed out of her cheeks. "An SDC strike team? That makes no sense, Sir."

"One of your sister's teammates is Blake Belladonna. Her file is…sparse on details, probably intentionally, but there is a possibility that her father is Ghira Belladonna."

"The Menagerie Chieftan?"

"Correct," Ironwood said. "We know he has a daughter about the right age."

"Does that mean Kali is the presumed mother?"

Ironwood pursed his lips. "We had no indications that Ghira _or_ Kali had any personal or family relationships until their marriage was announced shortly before Ghira was elected to the Chieftanship."

Winter's eyes flickered, "I knew their marriage came as a surprise…"

"And now you know just how big of a surprise," Ironwood said. "The White Fang group Ghira moved with had a number of orphans and offspring of members that it watched out for. When Kali didn't become pregnant after the marriage, it was assumed he adopted, or had one by a previous relationship."

"Then it's confirmed that this Blake is _not_ Kali's daughter? The version of Kali's file I have access to is redacted enough that—"

"Those aren't redactions or excisions, Winter," Ironwood sighed. "The gaps in where we have positive knowledge of Kali's whereabouts and doings are sufficient to conceal multiple pregnancies, not just one. We don't even have a family name, or confirmation that she wasn't using one, prior to her marriage. The possibility that Kali is Blake's mother, whether natural or adoptive, is entirely speculative, but it's one we have to take seriously."

"I see."

"I am personally of the suspicion that Blake was, or perhaps is, a highly-ranked White Fang operative under the direct command of Adam Taurus. Our current intelligence assessment is that he is the White Fang's regional leader for Vale."

"And Ozpin enrolled her?" Winter asked sharply.

"Given Ozpin's proximity it is probable that he has better, or at least more complete, information that I do," Ironwood said mildly. "That said, it is not a suspicion I have shared until now…with anyone."

Winter's eyes tightened. "Has anyone suggested such a connection to you, Sir?"

"No."

Her head inclined fractionally.

Ironwood smothered a smile as Winter drew the connections. He hadn't been the one to tip off Jacques, but neither had Jacques warned him.

"The incident that took place saw three teams, two first-year and one second-year, providing cover for a meeting between Blake Belladonna, and a tiger-form faunus who meets the physical description of Sienna Khan."

"Gods of light _and_ darkness," Winter breathed. "The High Leader of the White Fang was in downtown Vale, Father tried to stage an assassination that was broken up by teenage huntresses, and Ozpin did _nothing?_ "

"Suspected High Leader," Ironwood said. "Even if she is, Sienna's identity at the meeting remains unconfirmed. The attempt was apparently to kidnap both Blake and Sienna, not a simple assassination. The strike team terminated every faunus in the immediate area with the exception of two huntresses-in-training and the tiger-form, though all three were injured, one of the trainees severely. More tellingly, no human civilian was injured despite being present in considerable numbers."

"That suggests remarkable restraint, or precision, on the part of the trainees," Winter said.

"Doesn't it just?" Ironwood asked.

"Response?"

"The SDC response has been negligible except to assert that the strike team was composed of people no longer employed by the Schnee Dust Company. Ozpin has said nothing, and the Vale Council has limited itself to 'punishing those responsible.'"

"And the White Fang?"

"The White Fang hasn't so much as released a statement, instead letting Ozpin and the Vale Council carry the weight. The perpetrators have already been charged with hate crimes."

Winter's jaw tensed. "That is a degree of restraint that Adam Taurus is unknown for, and shows an uncanny subtlety on Sienna's part."

"Isn't it just?"

"I appreciate you keep me informed, Sir," Winter said. "Is there anything else?"

"I'm relocating to Vale for the semester as a prelude to the Vytal Festival," Ironwood said.

"I'm aware."

"My advance team will be on-station in the coming weeks. While they're drawing attention to themselves I want you to insert more covertly. Get a ground-eye view of things. I'll let Ozpin know you'll be in the area, but for now I want you to be subtle."

"Yes, Sir. And Weiss?"

Ironwood hummed softly. "Jacques is undoubtedly keeping an eye on Weiss and her team. I would prefer he not have a reason to question your presence."

Winter nodded. "If he detected my presence now he'd wonder what I was doing in Vale. If I appear as part of your entourage he would have no reason to dig deeper."

"Exactly," Ironwood said.

"Do you have reason to distrust Ozpin?"

"No," Ironwood said flatly. "If everything goes to hell and I'm unavailable, I need you to know you can trust Ozpin, Winter."

"Yes, Sir."

"However…Ozpin probably has more reason than most not to fully trust anyone. He can be cautious towards people. Not without reason, but it can be…limiting."

Ironwood nodded. "Turn your current assignments over to your deputy, Winter. If he isn't prepared this is a better time to find out than most. Get on the ground. Look around, keep your eyes open, don't be seen, and don't get engaged unless you need to. But if you need to, kick ass."

"Yes, Sir."

"Dismissed."

Winter rose and saluted. "Sir."

Ironwood stood and returned it, watching his subordinate about-face and stride towards his door. "Oh, and Winter?"

Pause. Turn. "Sir?"

"Keep your temper around Qrow Branwen."

* * *

Vala bar Adama's quarters  
Beacon Academy  
Vale

"Hey, that was damn good shooting," I object later as you sit in your quarters.

"For our first semester. Before the Fall. Yes. But for what's coming?"

"Harsh, Bla—"

" _Vala_ ," you snarl. You take a deep breath. "Sorry."

"No you aren't," I reply. "That was my bad. Ozpin…hit a little close to home."

You nod in agreement. "Ruby's shooting isn't good enough. Pyrrha's shooting isn't good enough. They aren't _good enough_ , and we are rapidly running out of time. You know as well as I that there is zero chance of keeping them out of it. Not unless we box the whole lot of them up and ship them to Vacuo, or possibly Menagerie."

My turn to sigh. "That will only delay things a bit."

"Exactly. I sympathize. She was looking right at someone when he was killed. But she froze. Not for very long. Not long enough to matter—this time! But in the future? You remember what happened when she realized what happened to all those people she knocked off the train?"

"And what happened the first time she deliberately killed a person," I said. "What do you think is going to happen to mini-me?"

"Gods but I wish I knew," you reply. The kettle whistles and you get up.

I watch as you go through the ritual of heating the pot, then adding water and leaves.

"Well, if she's anything like us—"

"She isn't," you say.

"Uh, they _are_ us," I reply. "Just, you know, newer models."

You snort harshly.

"They aren't, actually," you say. "You're inside—mostly inside—my augmentation package. Our auras overlap, but we are both distinct entities unless we deliberately share. Yang's connection is soul-deep. That…isn't unheard of. But there are _three_ connections and they are all one-way only. I've never heard of that happening before. What about you? Find anything on the 'net?"

"Oh, lots of stuff," I say. "Stuff that'll make your fur curl. Unfortunately it's all speculative fiction. By the way, faunus are just as perverse as humans. It's a bit higher-quality, probably because there are fewer of you."

"I'm sure I didn't need to know that."

* * *

CEO's Office  
SDC Global Headquarters  
Downtown Atlas  
Atlas

Jacques slowly lowered the slate so that it made a soft, but crisp, _tink_ as he set it on his desk. He stared at it a moment longer, then looked up at the only other person in his downtown Atlas top-floor office.

"All of them?" Jacques demanded.

"Not all. The support team left before the operation launched, and the exfiltration team departed when the strike team missed both of its rendezvous."

"You know what I meant."

Augustus Black nodded silently. "Vale has released a full list of people arrested. Two people, the team's sniper and her spotter, aren't on it. Presumably they are still free."

"How long until we have _their_ report of what happened?"

"Assuming they remain free? If they make for the tertiary egress route we can conceive a medical emergency and have them airlifted to Atlas from the boat tomorrow, so perhaps the day after. If they choose to retreat into their covers, then approximately ten days when their 'vacation' ends. Any of the other extraction plans are somewhere between those two dates and increase the likelihood of their being compromised. Another alternative is they make use of a presupply cache and go native, possibly into the Vale countryside, possibly over the Wall, after which they try to evade back to Atlas on their own, or just stay down until the attention has died down. In that case we may be looking at several weeks to several months, if ever."

"And if any of those captured talk—"

"Each squad had knowledge of only its own covers. Likewise, the support units only knew which squad they were supporting, and the exfiltration teams knew none of those. Their covers are secure."

"We think."

Augustus nodded equanimously. "We think."

A percussive thud echoed in the room as Jacques' fist bounced off his desk. "Damn it all to hell. What was Weiss thinking?"

"About which part?"

"Any of it! One of her teammates is the daughter of Ghira Belladonna, and she doesn't inform me. For that matter, she was meeting with the leader of the White Fang! And despite that, Weiss intervened to _help_ the animals!"

Augustus considered how to reply for a moment. For all Jacques' rampant speciesism he usually took some effort to keep his tone and words to those that were…socially acceptable. And even when he didn't, he rarely dismissed them as mere animals. A dog, after all, couldn't talk.

"It is likely that she was unaware," Augustus replied. "About the familial connection, at least. I've pulled Weiss' security briefings, they rarely had any information on the political situation in Menagerie. What information they did contain was mostly of a tertiary nature. How events in Atlas were playing out on the world stage.

"And Sienna's position, even her last name, was unconfirmed until now. We knew she was a high-ranking operative, of course. For that matter, we still don't _know_ she is their top-level leader."

"She must be. Otherwise the official statement would have come from Taurus or one of his mouthpieces."

"She could be a new mouthpiece, or Taurus' replacement. For that matter, she could be an operative with sufficient rank to pull her own press release; a troubleshooter, or a diplomatic agent, perhaps. Two guards would make sense for a high-level courier. For their 'high leader' I would have expected…more. If only from local resources."

"Maybe the strike team put down additional guards and Vale isn't reporting it, or has them mixed in with the 'faunus civilians.' The White Fang would love that!"

"Perhaps. And that might be something to ask Weiss about…eventually. The two confirmed guards are both known to us. Both known to work as enforcers for high rank agents. None of the other faunus we were able to ID, other than Belladonna and Sienna, are in our records as agents or collaborators. Several are listed as sympathizers, but that would be true of most faunus in our records."

The SDC faunus database was one that Black frequently found cumbersome and unwieldy. It was adept at drawing out complicated relationships, finding patterns, and tracing connections. In some ways the data it generated was very useful, or would have been if one Augustus Black was running the spy agency that had originally developed the program. Unfortunately, while it found connections it was prone to type I errors, and he didn't have the spies—and, more importantly, the analysts—to tell him which connections and patterns were important and which ones were so much chaff.

The SDC was a business, and its business was extracting, refining, processing, transporting, and selling Dust. Its business was not—White Fang propaganda, and Jacques Schnee's occasional rants, to the contrary—oppressing the faunus, waging a covert war against the White Fang, or trying to destroy Menagerie.

"Weiss' security briefs do not include a complete breakdown of White Fang's command and organizational structure. It is unlikely that she would have realized who Sienna was unless Belladonna told her outright."

"Just what _do_ those security briefings contain, I wonder?"

"Local threats. How to get word to us. Allies, escape routes locations of prepared safehouses, stashes of weapons, money, food, clothes, and Dust; various code phrases, and distress and duress words. They're intended to keep her safe, not give her operational knowledge."

"And three teams of huntsmen from Beacon just happened to be there?"

"Belladonna's team obviously went with her. The others, it's a popular shopping mall on a weekend. They're huntresses in training, of course they ran to a fight. And, seeing one of their own being kidnapped, of course they intervened. Weiss had no knowledge of the operation. That was both a safety measure for her and a security measure for us. You said it was important that we be able to deny involvement if things went sour."

"One that blew up in our face."

"The fact that Weiss is on the same team as Belladonna meant this was always going to be a sticky operation. Especially if it had succeeded."

"You'll forgive me for saying that sounds and awful lot like you trying to find a silver lining."

"That is because I am," Augustus replied. He folded his hands in front of him.

"Fine," Jacques said. "What happens now? Can we make another try for Sienna—for Khan?"

"Unlikely. What assets we still have in the area are primarily informational, not actionable. I suppose we could ad lib something, but that would be messy, dangerous, and have a high risk of exposure. Additionally, Sie— _Khan_ —was last seen being taken to Beacon's medical facility. Ozpin will no doubt arrange a surreptitious exit for her. And if we attempt to retrieve her during the Trial—and if a third party does so it will almost certainly be linked to us in the public's mind—people will assume we have something to hide."

"What of our men?"

"Terrorism charges," Augustus shrugged.

"But—"

"Oh, if it had been a general massacre, thugs waving around automatic weapons like hoses and such, it would undoubtably be called terrorism as well. The selective targeting of faunus makes this a 'hate crime' and Vale treats that as de facto terrorism."

"And if they only killed humans?" Jacques asked acidly.

"Mass murder," Augustus replied, "which is also one of the charges, yes."

"Options?"

"Terminate them before they link back to us. Leave them alone. Discredit them. Or retrieve them."

"Retrieve them," Jacques said. "One way or another I always pay my debts. Vale still uses exile somewhere infested with grimm to execute terrorists?"

"Yes. You want to pick them up then?"

"Might as well. Outside the Wall it outside the law, so we wouldn't be breaking any laws to do so. As a matter of fact, I want you to draft up an extradition request. Put their attack on my daughter as a reason to move this to Atlas."

"It won't be granted," Augustus said.

"Of course it won't. But it'll make the retrieval look expected."


End file.
